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Book. . r\4 _r- 



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By Bxcheng© 
Army and Nr,vy OhM 
May ii'i, 1129 



^■■rtt 



RE V E RIE S 



oy 



A BACHELOR. 



OR 



A Book of the Heart. 

Author of Fresh Glbaninos. 



It is worth the labor — saith Plotinus — to consider well of 

Love, whether it be a God, or a divell, or passion of the minde, 
or partly God, partly divell, partly passion. 

Burton's Anatomv. 



xhihteentii edition. 
New York : 

Olljarles Scribner. 

1851. 



PS x^ ot 



Entered according to Act ol Congress, in the year 1850, by 

Donald G. Mitchell, 

In tUe Clerk's office of the District Court of the United States, for the 

Southern District of New York. 



^ By Excht.ij; 

»"' Army and JV;... 



May i^7, I §29 



e 

Club 



N K U' V O R K : 
■ TEBEOTY ED 6Y 

c. w. benedict: 

301 WILLIAM ST. 



rs 



iJr, 



€0 

iHrs. €. C. Wixon, 

of 

i^artfori), Connectiatt, 

Ql\)is book 

IS xts^ntMivi inscribed; 

bg Ijcr fricnlr, 



PREFACE. 



ry^HIS book is neither more, nor less than it pretends 
-L to be ; it is a collection of those floating Reveries 
which have, from time to time, drifted across my 
brain. I never yet met with a bachelor who had not 
his share of just such floating visions ; and the only 
difference between us lies in the fact, that I have 
tossed them from me in the shape of a Book. 

If they had been worked over with more unity of 
design, I dare say I might have made a respectable 
novel ; as it is, I have chosen the honester way of 
setting them down as they came seething from my 
thought, with all their crudities and contrasts, uncov- 
ered 



vi Preface. 

As for the truth that is in them, the wcrld may 
believe what it likes ; for having written to humor the 
world, it would be hard, if I should curtail any of its 
privileges of judgment. I should think there was as 
much truth in them, as in most Reveries. 

The first story of the book has already had some 
publicity ; and the criticisms upon it have amused, 
and pleased me. One honest journalist avows that it 
could never have been written by a bachelor. I 
thank him for thinking so well of me ; and heartily 
wish that his thought were as true, as it is kind. 

Yet I am inclined to think that bachelors are the 
only safe, and secure observers of all the phases of 
married life. The rest of the world have their hob- 
bies ; and by law, as well as by immemorial custom 
are reckoned unfair witnesses in everything relating 
to their matrimonial affairs. 

Perhaps I ought however to make an exception in 
favor of spinsters, who like us, are independent spec- 
tators, and possess just that kind of indifference to 
the marital state, which makes them intrepid in their 
observations, and very desirable for — authorities. 



Preface. vii 

As for the style of the book, I have nothing to say 
for it. except to refer to my title. These are not 
sei'mons, nor essays, nor criticisms ; — they are only 
Reveries. And if the reader should stumble upon 
occasional magniloquence, or be worried with a little 
too much of sentiment, pray, let him remember, — 
that I am dreaming. 

But while I say this, in the hope of nicking off the 
wiry edge of my reader's judgment, I shall yet stand 
up boldly for the general tone, and character of the 
book. If there is bad feeling in it, or insincerity, or 
shallow sentiment, or any foolish depth of affection 
betrayed, — I am responsible ; and the critics maj 
expose it to their hearts' content. 

I have moreover a kindly feeling for these Rev- 
eries, from their very private character ; they consisi 
mainly of just such whinjseys, and reflections, as a 
great many brother bachelors are apt to indulge in, 
but which they are too cautious, or too prudent to lay 
before the world. As I have in this matter, shown a 
frankness, and naivete which are unusual, I shall ask 
a corresponding frankness in my reader ; and I can 
assure him safely that this is eminently one of those 



dii Preface. 

books which were ' never intended for publica- 
tion.' 

In the hope that this plain avowal may quicken the 
reader's charity, and screen me from cruel judgment, 

I remain, with sincere good wishes, 

Ik. Marvel. 

nev xork nov., 1850. 



CONTENTS. 



FIRST REVERIE. 

Over a "Wood Fire, 15 

I. Smoke, signifying Doubt, .... 19 

II. Blaze, signifying Cueer, .... 29 

III. Ashes, signifying Desolation, ... 38 

SE C OND RE VERIE. 

By A City Gtrate, 53 

I. Sea-coal, 61 

II Anthracite, 80 

1* ' 



CONTEN rs. 



THIRD REVERIE. 



Over his Cigar, 

I. Lighted with a Coal, 

II. Lighted with a wisp of Papee, 

III. Lighted with a Match, . 



99 
103 
117 
132 



FO UFv Til RE VERIE. 



Morning, Noon and Evening, . . 


. . 149 


I. Morning — which is the Past, . 


157 


School days. 


167 


The Sea, .... 


17S 


Father-Land, 


1S6 


A Roman Girl, . . . . 


195 


The Appenines, . . • 


205 


Enrica, . . . • 


214 


II. Noon — which is the Present, . 


223 


Early Friends, . 


226 


School Revisited, . . 


233 


College, .... 


239 


Bella's Pacquet, 


246 



Contents 



XI 



III. Evening — which is the Faxu&E, • . 256 

Carry, 2C0 

The Lktter, ..... 2C9 

New Travel, . , , . . 275 

Home, 2S7 



Jfirsl HcDcrit. 



0mokc, liamt anb '2.3\]t3. 



OVER A WOOD FIRE. 



I HAVE got a iplet farmhouse in the country, a 
very humble place to be sure, tenanted by a 
worthy enough man, of the old New-England stamp, 
where I sometimes go for a day or two in the winter, 
to look over the form-accounts, and to see how the 
stock is thriving on the winter's keep. 

One side the door, as you enter from the porch, ia 
a little parlor, scarce twelve feet by ten, with a cosy 
looking fire-place — a heavy oak floor — a couple of 
arm chairs and a brown table with carved lions' feet 
Out of this room opens a little cabinet, only big 
enough for a broad bachelor bedstead, where I sleep 
lipon feathers, and wake in the morning, with my eye 
upon a saucy colored, lithographic print of some 
fancy " Bessy." 



16 Reveries OF a Bachelor. 

It happens to be the only house in the world, of 
which I am lona-Jich owner ; and I take a vast deal 
of comfort in treating it just as I choose. I manage 
to break some article of furniture, almost every time 
I pay it a visit ; and if I cannot open the window 
readily of a morning, to breathe the fresh air, I knock 
out a pane or two of glass with my boot. I leau 
against the walls in a very old arm-chair there is on 
the promises, and scarce ever fail to worry such a 
hole in the plastering, as would set me down for a 
round charge for damages in town, or make a prim 
housewife fret herself into a raging fever. I laugh 
out loud with myself, in my big arm-chair, when I 
think that I am neither afraid of one, nor the other. 

As for the fire, I keep the little hearth so hot, as to 
warm half the cellar below, and the whole space be- 
tween the jams, roars for hours together, with white 
flame. To be sure, the windows are not very tight, 
between broken panes, and bad joints, so that the 
fire, large as it is, is by no means an extravagant 
comfort. 

As night approaches, I have a huge pile of oak 
and hickory placed beside the hearth ; I put out the 
tallow candle on the mantel, (using the family snuf- 
fers, with one leg broke,) — then, drawing my chair 
directly in front of the blazing wood, and setting one 
foot on each of the old iron fire-dogs, (until they 



Over a 7V>od Fire. 17 

grow too warm,) I dispose myself for an evening of 
such sober, and thouglitful quietude, as I believe, on 
my soul, that very few of my fellow-men have the 
good fortune to enjoy. 

My tenant meantime, in the other room, I can 
hear now and then, — though there is a thick stone 
chimney, and broad entry between, — multiplying con- 
trivances with his wife, to put two babies to sleep. 
This occupies them, I should say, usually an hour ; 
though my only measure of time, (for I never carry 
a watch into the country,) is the blaze of my fire. 
By ten, or thereabouts, my stock of wood is nearly 
exhausted ; I pile upon the hot coals what remains, 
and sit watching how it kindles, and blazes, and goes 
out, — even like our joys ! — and then, slip by the light 
of the embers into my bed, where I luxuriate in such 
sound, and healthful slumber, as only such rattling 
window frames, and country air, can supply. 

But to return : the other evening — it happened to 
be on my last visit to my farm-house — when I had 
exhausted all the ordinary rural topics of thought, 
had formed all sorts of conjectures as to the income 
of the year ; had planned a new wall around one lot, 
and the clearing up of another, now covered with 
patriarchal wood ; and wondered if the little ricketty 
house would not be after all a snug enough box, to 
live and to die in — I fell on a sudden into such an 



18 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

unprecedented line of thought, which took such deep 
hold of my sympathies — sometimes even starting 
tears — that I determined, the next day, to set as 
much of it as I could recal, on paper. 

Something — it may have been the home-looking 
blaze, (I am a bachelor of — say six and twenty,) or 
possibly a plaintive cry of the baby in my tenant's 
room, had suggested to me the thought of — Marriage. 

I piled upon the heated fire-dogs, the last arm-full 
of my wood ; and now, said I, bracing myself cour- 
ageously between the arms of my chair, — I'll not 
flinch ; — I'll pursue the thought wherever it leads, 
though it lead me to the d — (I am apt to be hasty,) 
— at least — continued I, softening, — until my fire is 
out. 

The wood was green, and at first showed no dis- 
position to blaze. It smoked furiously. Smoke, 
thought I, always goes before blaze ; and so does 
doubt go before decision : and my Reverie, from that 
very starting point, slipped into this shape : — 



I. 



Smoke — S ignifying Doubt 

A WIFE ?— thought I ;— yes, a wife ! 
And -why ? 

And pi'ay, my dear sir, why not — why ? Wb-c not 
doubt; why not hesitate ; why not .remble ? 

Does a man buy a ticket in i loitery — a poor man, 
whose whole earnings go in ^o secure the ticket, — 
without trembling, hesitating , and doubting ? 

Can a man stake his bachelor respectability, his 
independence, and comfort, upon the die of absorbing, 
unchanging, relentless marriage, without trembling at 
the ventui-e ? 

Shall a man who has been free to chase his fancies 
oyer the wide-world, without lett or hindrance, shut 



20 II EYERIES OF A BaCHELOR. 

himself up to marriage-ship, within four walls called 
Home, that arc tc claim him, his time, his trouble, 
and his tears, thenceforward forever more, without 
doubts thick, and thick-coming as Smoke ? 

Shall he who has been hitherto a mere observer of 
other men's cares, and business — moving off where 
they made him sick of heart, approaching ■whenever 
and wherever they made him gleeful — shall he now 
undertake admiuistration of just such cares and busi- 
ness, without qualms ? Shall he, whose whole life has 
been but a nimble succession of escapes from trifling 
difficulties, now broach without doubtings — that Mat- 
rimony, where if difficulty beset him, there is no 
escape ? Shall this brain of mine, careless-working, 
never tired with idleness, feeding on long vagaries, 
and high, gigantic castles, dreaming out beatitudes 
hour by hour — turn itself at length to such dull task- 
work, as thinking out a livelihood for wife and 
children ? 

Where thenceforward will be those sunny dreams, 
in which I have warmed my fancies, and my heart, 
and lighted my eye with crystal ? This very mar- 
riage, which a brilliant working imagination has in- 
vested time and again with brightness, and delight, 
can serve no longer as a mine for teeming fancy : all, 
alas, will be gone — reduced to the dull standard of 
the actual ! No more room for intrepid forays of 



S M O K E S I G N 1 F Y I N G D ) U li T . -' 1 

imagination — no more gorgeous realm-making — all 
will be over ! 

Why not, 1 thought, go on dreaming ? 

Can any wife be prettier than an after dinner 
fancy, idle and yet vivid, can paint for you ? Can 
any children make less noise, than the little rosy- 
cheeked ones, who have no existence, except in the 
nmiiium gatherum of your own brain ? Can any 
housewife be more unexceptionable, than she who 
goes sweeping daintily the cobwebs that gather iu 
your dreams ? Can any domestic larder be better 
stocked, than the private larder of your head dozing 
on a cushioned chair-back at Delmonico's ? Can any 
family purse be better filled than the exceeding 
plump one, you dream of, after reading such pleasant 
books as Munchausen, or Typee ? 

But if, after all, it must be — duty, or what-not, 
making provocation — what then ? And I clapped 
my feet hard against the fire-dogs, and leaned back, 
\nd turned my face to the ceiling, as much as to say ; 
— And where on earth, then, shall a poor devil look 
for a wife ? 

Somebody says, Lyttleton or Shaftesbury I think, 
that " marriages would be happier if they were aU 
arranged by the Lord Chancellor." Unfortunately, 
we have no Lord Chancellor to make this commu- 
tation ol our misery 



22 II E V E K I F. S F A B A C H E L H . 

Shall a man then scour the country on a miile'fe 
back, like Honest Gil Bias of Santillane ; or shall he 
make application to some such intervening provi- 
dence as Madame St. Marc, who, as I see by the 
Pressc, manages these matters to one's hand, for some 
five per cent, on the fortunes of the parties .'' 

I have trouted, when the brook was so low, and 
the sky so hot, that I might as well have thrown my 
fly upon the turnpike ; and I have hunted hare at 
noon, and wood-cock in snow-time, — never despair- 
ing, scarce doubting ; but for a poor hunter of his 
kind, without traps or snares, or any aid of police or 
constabulary, to traverse the world, where are swarm- 
ing^ on a moderate computation, some three hundred 
and odd millions of unmarried women, for a single 
capture — irremediable, unchangeable — and yet a cap- 
ture which by strange metonymy, not laid down in 
the books, is very apt to turn captor into captive, 
and make game of hunter — all this, surely, surely 
may make a man shrug with doubt ! 

Then — again, — there are the plaguey wife's-rela- 
tions. Who knows how many third, fourth, or fifth 
cousins, will appear at careless complimentary inter- 
vals, long after you had settled into the placid belief 
that all congrat-ilatory visits were at an end ? How 
many twisted headed brothers will bi putting in *heir 
advice, as a friend to Peggy r 



Smoke — Signifying Dovbt. 23 

How many maiden aunts will come to spend a 
month or two with their " dear Peggy," and want to 
know every tea-time, " if she isn't a dear love of a 
wife r" Then, dear father-in-law, will beg, (taking 
dear Peggy's hand in his,) to give a little wholesome 
counsel ; and will be very sure to advise just the con- 
trary of what you had determined to undertake. And 
dear mamma-in-law, must set her nose into Peggy's 
cupboard, and insist upon having the key to your 
own private locker in the wainscot. 

Then, perhaps, there is a little bevy of dirty-nosed 
nephews who come to spend the holydays, and eat up 
your East India sweetmeats ; and who are forever 
tramping over your head, or raising the Old Harry 
below, while you are busy with your clients. Last, 
and worst, is some fidgety old uncle, forever too cold 
or too hot, who vexes you with his patronizing airs, 
and impudently kisses his little Peggy ! 

That could be borne, however : for perhaps 

he has promised his fortune to Peggy. Peggy, then, 
will be rich : — (and the thought made me rub my 
shins, which were now getting comfortably warm upon 
the fire-dogs.) Then, she will be forever talking of 
her fortune ; and pleasantly reminding you on occa- 
sion of a favorite purchase, — how lucky that she had 
the means ; and dropping hints about economy ; and 
buying very extravagant Paisleys 



24 R E V E K J E S O F A B A C H E L R . 

She will annoy you by looking over the stock-list 
at breakfast time ; and mention quite carelessly to 
your clients, that she is interested in such or such a 
speculation. 

She will be provokingly silent when you hint to q 
tradesman, that you have not the money by you, for 
his small bill ; — in short, she will tear the life out of 
you, making you j^ay in righteous retribution of 
annoyance, grief, vexation, shame, and sickness of 
heart, for the superlative folly of " mariying rich," 

But if not rich, then poor. Bah ! the thought 

made me stir the coals ; but there was still no blaze. 
The paltry earnings you are able to wring out of 
clients by the sweat of your brow, will now be all our 
income ; you will be pestered for pin-money, aud 
pestered with your poor wife's-relations. Ten to one, 
she will stickle about taste — " Sir Visto's" — and 
want to make this so pretty, and that so charming, if 
she only had the means ; and is sure Paul (a kiss) 
can't deny his little Peggy such a trifling sum, and 
all for the common benefit. 

Then she, for one, means that her children shan t 
go a begging for clothes, — and another pull at thn 
pui-se. Trust a poor mother to dress her children in 
finery ! 

Perhaps she is ugly ; — not noticeable at first ; but 
growing on her, and (what is worse) growing faster 



Smoke — S i g n t r- v i n g D o u c t . 25 

OB you. You wonder why you did'nt see that vulgar 
nose long ago : and that lip — it is very strange, you 
think, that you ever thought it pretty. And then, — 
to come to breakfast, with her hair looking as it does, 
and you, not so much as daring to say — " Peggy, do 
brush your hair !" Her foot too — not very bad when 
decently c/imissce — but now since she's married, she 
does wear such infernal slippers ! And yet for all 
this, to be prigging up for an hour, when any of my 
old chums come to dine with me ! 

" Bless your kind hearts ! my dear fellows," said I, 
thrusting the tongs into the coals, and speakino- out 
loud, as if my voice could reach from Virginia to 
Paris — " not married yet !" 

Perhaps Peggy is pretty enough — only shrewish. 

No matter for oold coffi'C ; — you should have 

been up before. 

What sad, thin, poorly cooked chops, to eat with 
your rolls ! 

She thinks they are very good, and wonders 

how you can set such an example to your children. 

The butter is nauseating. 

She has no other, and hopes you'll not raise a 

storm about butter a little turned. — I think I see 
myself— ruminated I — sitting meekly at table, scarce 
daring to lift up my eyes, utterly fagged out with 
some quarrel of yesterday, choking down detestably 



26 Reveries OF A Bachelor 

sour muffins, that my wife thinks are " delicious" — 
slipping in dried mouthfuls of burnt ham off the side 
of my fork tines, — slipping off my chair side-ways at 
the end, and slipping out with my hat between my 
knees, to business, and never feeling myself a compe- 
tent, sound-minded man, till the oak door is between 
me and Peggy ! 

— ' Tjn ha, — not yet !" said I ; and in so earnest a 
tone, that my dog started to his feet — cocked his eye 
to have a good look into my face — met my smile of 
triumph with an amiable wag of the tail, and curled 
up again in the eoi-ner. 

Again, Peggy is rich enough, well enough, mild 
enough, only she doesn't care a fig for you. She has 
married you because father, or grandfather thought 
the match eligible, and because she didn't wish to 
disoblige them. "Besides, t^he didn't positively hate 
you, and thought you were a respectable enough 
person ; — she has told you so repeatedly at dinner. 
She wonders you like to read poetry ; she wishes you 
would buy her a good cook-book ; and insists upon 
your making your will at the birth of the first baby. 

She thinks Captain So-and-So a splendid looking 
fellow, and wishes you would trim up a little, were 
it only for appearance' sake. 

You need not hurry up from the office so early at 
night : — she, bless her dear heart ! — does not feel 



S M K E S r G N I F Y I N G D U B T . 27 

lonely. You read to her a love tale ; she interrupts 
the pathetic parts with directions to her seamstress. 
You read of marriages : she sighs, and asks if Captain 
So and So ha? left town ? She hates to be mewed up 
in a cottage, or between brick walls ; she does so love 
the Springs ! 

But, again, Peggy loves you ; — at least she swears 
it, with her hand on the Sorrows of Werter. She 
has pin-money which she spends for the Literary 
World, and the Friends in Council. She is not bad- 
looking, save a bit too much of forehead ; nor is she 
sluttish, unless a neglige till three o'clock, and an ink 
stain on the fore finger be sluttish ; — but then she is 
such a sad blue ! 

You never fancied when you saw her buried in a 
three volume novel, that it was anything more than a 
gii'lish vagary; and when she quoted Latin, you 
thought innocently, that she had a capital memory 
for her samplers. 

But to be bored eternally about Divine Dante and 
funny G oldoni, is too bad. • Your copy of Tasso, a 
treasure print of 16S0, is all bethumbed and dogs- 
eared, and spotted with baby gruel. Even your 
Seneca — an Elzevir — is all sweaty with handling. 
She adores La Fontaine, reals Balzac with a kind of 
artist-scowl, and will not let Grreek alone. 

You hint at broken rest nnd an achinn; head at 



Reveries of a Bachelor 

breakfast, and she will fling jou a scrap of Anthology 
— in lieu of the camphor bottle — or chant the «/«! 
Rlorr, of tragic chorus. 

The nurse is getting dinner ; you arc holding 

the baby ; Peggy is reading Bruyere. 

The fire smoked thick as pitch, and puffed out 
little clouds over the chimney piece. I gave the 
fore-stick a kick, at thought of Peo-gy, baby, and 
Bruyere. 

Suddenly the flame flickered bluely athwart 

the smoke — caught at a twig below — rolled round the 
mossy oak-stick — twined among the crackling treo- 
limbs — mounted — lit up the whole body of smoke, 
and blazed out cheerily and bright. Doubt vanished 
•with Smoke, and Hope began with Flame. 



II. 

Blaze — Scgnifying Cheer. 

I PUSHED my chair hack; drew up another 
stretched out my feet cosily upon it, rested my 
elbows on the chair arms, leau'^'d my head on one hand 
and looked straight into the leaping, and dancing 
flame 

Love is a flame — ruminated I ; and (glancing 

I'ound the room) how a flame brightens up a man's 
habitation. 

" Carlo," said I, calling up my dog into the light, 
" good fellow, Carlo !" and I patted him kindly, and 
he wagged his tail, and laid his nose across my knee, 
and looked wistfully up in my face ; then strode 
away, — turned to look again, and lay down to sleep. 



30 R. EVE HIES OF A Bachelor. 

" Pho, the brute !" said I, " it is not enough after 
all, to like a dog." 

If now in that chair yonder, not the one your 

feet lie upon, but the other, beside you — closer yet — 
were seated a sweet-faced girl, with a pretty little 
foot lying out upon the hearth — a bit of lace running 
round the swelling throat — the hair parted to a charm 
over a forehead fair as any of your dreams ; — and if 
you could reach an arm around that chair back, 
without fear of giving offence, and suffer your fingers 
to play idly with those curls that escape down the 
neck; and if you could clisp with your other hand 
those little white, taper fingers of hers, which lie so 
temptingly within reach,— and so, talk softly and low 
in presence of the blaze, while the hours slip without 
knowledge, and the winter winds whistle uncarcd 
for ; — if, in short, you were no bachelor, but the 
husband of some such sweet image — (dream, call it 
rather,) would it not be far pleasanter than this cold 
single night-sitting — counting the sticks — reckoning 
tbe length of the blaze, and the height of the falling 
snow .'' 

And if, some or all of those wild vagaries that 
grow on your fancy at such an hour, you could whisper 
into listening, because loving ears — ears not tired with 
listening, because it is you who whisper — ears ever 
indulgent because eager to pnilsj ;— and if your 



Blaze — Signifying Cheer. 31 

darkest fancies were lit up, not merely witli bright 
wood fire, but with a ringing laugh of that sweet face 
turned up in fond rebuke — how far better, than to be 
waxing black, and sour, over pestilential humors — 
alone — your very dog asleep ! 

And if when a glowing thought comes into your 
brain, quick and sudden, you could tell it over as to 
a second self, to that sweet creature, who is not 
away, because she loves to be there ; and if you could 
watch the thought catching that girlish mind, illuming 
that fair brow, sparkling in those pleasantest of eyes — 
how far better than to feel it slumbering, and going 
out, heavy, lifeless, and dead, in your own selfish 
fancy. And if a generous emotion steals over you — 
coming, you know not whither, would there not be a 
richer charm in lavishing it iu caress, or endearing 
word, upon that fondest, and most dear one, than in 
patting your glossy coated dog, or sinking lonely to 
smiling slumbers ? 

How would not benevolence ripen with such monitor 
to task it ! How would not selfishness grow faint and 
dull, leaning ever to that second self, which is the 
loved one ! How would not guile shiver, and grow 
weak, before that girl-brow, and eye of innocence 
How would not all that boyhood prized of enthusiasm, 
and quick blood, and life, renew itself in such 
presence ! 



32 Revejies of a Bachelor. 

The fire was getting hotter, and I moved into the 
middle of the room. The shadows the flames made, 
were playing like fairy forms over floor, and wall, 
and ceiling. 

My fancy would surely quicken, thought I, if such 
being were in attendance. Surely, imagination would 
be strong 3r, and purer, if it could have the playful 
fancies of dawning T>^omanhood to delight it. All toil 
would be torn from mind-labor, if but another heart 
grew into this present soul, quickening it, warming it, 
cheering it, bidding it ever, — God speed ! 

Her face would make a halo, rich as a rainbow, 
atop of all such noisome things, as we lonely souls 
call trouble. Her smile would illumine the blackest 
of crowding cares ; and darkness that now seats you 
despondent, in your solitary chair for days together, 
weaving bitter fancies, dreaming bitter dreams, would 
grow light and thin, and spread, and float away, — 
chased by that beloved smile. 

Your friend — poor fellow ! — dies : — never mind, 

that gentle clasp of her fingers, as she steals behind 

, you, telling you not to weep — it is worth ten friends ! 

Your sister, sweet one, is dead — buried. The 
worms are busy with aL her fairness. How it makes 
you think earth nothing but a spot to dig graves 
upon ! 

It ia more : she, sht says, will be a sister; and 



Blaze — Signifytng Cheer. 33 

the waving curls as she leans upon your shoulder, 
touch your cheek, and your wet eye turns to meet 
those other eyes God has sent his angel, surely ! 

Your mother, alas for it, she is gone ! Is there any 
bitterness to a youth, alone and homeless, like this? 

But you are not homeless ; you are not alone : she, 
is there ; — her tears softening yours, her smile lighting 
yours, her grief killing yours ; and you live again, to 
assuage that kind sorrow of hers. 

Then — those children, rosy, fair-haired ; no, they 
do not disturb you with their prattle now — they are 
yours ! Toss away ihere on the green-sward — never 
mind the hyacinths, the snowdrops, the violets, if so 
be any are there ; the perfume of their healthful lips 
is worth all the flowers of the world. No need now 
to gather wild bou(|uet3 to love, and cherish : flower, 
tree, gun, are all djad things ; things livelier hold 
your soul. 

And she, the mother, sweetest and fairest of all, 
watching, tending, caressing, loving, till your own heart 
grows pained with tendcrest jealousy, and cures itself 
with loving. 

You have no need now of any cold lecture to teach 
thankfulness : your heart is full of it. No need now, 
as once, of bursting blossoms, of trees taking leaf, and 
greenness, to turn thought kindly, and thankfully ; 
for ever, beside you, there is bloom, and ever beside 



34 Reveries of a Bachelor 

you there is fruit, — for wliicli eye, heart, and soul are 
full of unknown, and unspoken, because unspeakable, 
thank-offoring. 

And if sickness catches you, binds you, lays you 
down — no lonely nioauings, and wicked curses at 
careless stepping nurses. The, step is noiseless, and 
yet distinct beside you. The white curtains are 
drawn, or withdrawn by the magic of that other pres- 
ence ; and the soft, cool hand is upon your brow. 

No cold comfortings of friend-watchers, merely 
come in to steal a word away from that outer world 
which is pulling at their skirts ; but, ever, the sad, 
shaded brow of her, whose lightest sorrow for yom* 
sake is your greatest grief, — if it were not a greater 

The blaze was leaping light and high, and the wood 
■ falling under the grovying heat. 

So, continued I, this heart would be at length 

itself; — striving with every thing gross, even now as 
it clings to grossness. Love would make its strengtii 
native and progressive. Earth's cares would fly. 
Joys would double. Susceptibilities be quickened ; 
Love master self ; and having made the mastery, 
stretch onward, and upward toward Infinitude. 

And, if the end came, and sickness brought that 
follower — Great Follower — which sooner or later is 
sure to come after, then the heart, and the band of 



Blaze — Signifying Cheer. 35 

Love, ever near, are giving to youi tired soul, daily 
and hourly, lessons of that love which consoles, which 
triumphs, which circleth all, and centereth in all — 
Love Infinite, and Divine ! 

Kind hands — none but hen — will smooth the hair 
upon your brow as the chill grows damp, and heavy 
on it ; and her fingers — none but hers — will lie in 
yours as the wasted flesh stiifens, and hardens for the 
ground. IRr tears, — you could feel no others, if 
oceans fell — will warm your drooping features once 
more to life ; once more your eye lighted in joyous 
triumph, kindle in her smile, and then 

The fire fell upon the hearth ; the blaze gave a last 
leap — a flicker — then another — caught a little re* 
niaining twig — blazed uo — wavered — went out. 

There was nothing but h bed of glowing embers, 
over which the white ashes gathered fa.st. I was 
alone, with only my dog for company. 



III. 

Ashes — Signifying Desolation 

AFTER all, thouglit I, ashes follow blazo. 
inevitably as Death follows Life. Misery 
treads on the heels of Joy ; Anguish rides swift after 
Pleasure. 

" Come to me again, Carlo," said I, to my dog ; 
and I patted him fondly once more, but now only by 
the light of the dying embers. 

It is very little pleasure one takes in fondling bruto 
favorites ; but it is a pleasure that when it passes, 
leaves no void. It is only a little alleviating redun- 
dance in your solitary heart-life, which if lost, another 
can be supplied. 

But if your heart, not solitary — not quieting its 



Ashes — Signifying Desolation. 37 

humors with mere love of c]ias3,or dog — not repress- 
ing year after year, its earnest yearnings after some- 
thing better, and more spiritual, — has fairly linked 
itself by bonds strong as life, to another heart — is the 
casting oif easy, then ? 

Is it then only a little heart-redundancy cut off, 
which the next bright sunset will fill up ? 

And my fancy, as it had painted doubt under the 
smoke, and cheer under warmth of the blaze, so now 
it began under the faint light of the smouldering 
embers, to picture heart-desolation. 

^Yhat kind congratulatory letters, hosts of 

them, coming from old and half-forgotten friends, now 
that your happiness is a year, or two years old ' 

" Beautiful." 

Aye, to be sure beautiful ! 

"Kick" 

Pho, the dawdler ! how little he knows of heart- 
treasure, who speaks of wealth to a man who loves 
his wife, as a wife should only bo loved ! 

" Young." 

Young indeed ; guileless as infancy ; charming 

as the morning. 

Ah, these letters boar a sting : they bring to mind, 
with new, and newer freshness, if it be possible, the 
value of that, which you tremble lest you lose. 

How anxiously you watch that step — if it lo.se not 



38 Keveries of a Bachelor. 

its buoyancy ; How you study the colour on that 
cheek, if it grow not fainter ; How you tremble at 
the lustre in those eyes, if it be not the lustre of 
; Death ; How you totter under the weight of that 
muslin sleeve — a phantom weight ! How you fear to 
do it, and yet press forward, to note if that breathing 
be quickened, as you ascend the home-heights, to look 
off on sunsat lighting the plain. 

Is your sleep, quiet sleep, after that she has 
whispered to you her fears, and in the same breath — 
soft as a sigh, sharp as an arrow — bid you bear it 
bravely ? 

Perhaps, — the embers were now glowing fresher, 
a little kindling, before the ashes — she triumphs over 
disease. 

But, Poverty, the world's almoner, has come to 
you with ready, spare hand. 

Alone, with your dog living on bones, and you, on 
hope — kindling each morning, dying slowly each 
night, — this could be borne. Philosophy would bring 
home its stores to the lone-man. Money is not in his 
hand, but Knowledge is in his brain ! and from that 
brain he draws out faster, as he draws slower from his 
pocket. He remembers : and on remembrance he 
can live for days, and weeks. The garret, if a garret 
covers him, is rich in fancies. The rain if it pelts, 
pelts only him used to rain-peltings And his dog 



Ashe s — S ignifying Desolation. 39 

crouches not in dread, but in companionship. His 
erust he divides with him, and laughs. He crowns 
himself with glorious memories of Cervantes, though 
he begs : if he nights it under the stars, he dreams 
heaven-sent dreams of the prisoned, and homeless 
Gallileo. 

He hums old sonnets, and snatches of poor Jonson's 
plays. He chants Dryden's odes, and dwells on 
Otway's rhyme. He reasons with Boliugbroke or 
Diogenes, as the humor takes him'; and laughs at the 
world : for the world, thank Heaven, has left him 
alone ! 

Keep your money, old misers, and your palaces, 
old princes, — the world is mine ! 

I care not, Fortune, what you me deny, — 
You cannot rob me of free nature's grace, 

You cannot shut the windows of the sky ; 
You cannot bar my constant feet to trace 

The woods and lawns, by living streams, at eve, 
Let health, my nerves and finer fibres brace. 

And I, *'.eir toys, to the great chihiren, leave. 
Of Fancy, Reason, Virtue, naught can me bereave ! 

But — if not alone ? 

If she is clinging to you for support, for consolation, 
for home, for life — she, reared in luxury perhaps, is 
faint for bread ? 

Then, the iron enters the soul ; then the nights 



40 Reveries of a Uvciieltr. 

darken under any sky lii;lit. Then the days grow 
long, even in the solstice of •winter. 

She may not complain ; what then ? 

Will your heart grow strong, if the strength of her 
love can dam up the fountains of tears, and the tied 
tongue not tell of bereavement ? Will it solace you 
to find her parting the poor treasure of food you have 
stolen for her, with begging, foodless children ? 

But this ill, strong hands, and Heaven's help, will 
put down. Wealth again ; Flowers again ; Patrimonial 
acres again ; Brightness again. But your little Bessy, 
your favorite child is pining. 

Would to God ! you say in agony, that wealth 
could bring fulness again into that blanched cheek, 
or round those little thin lips once more ; but it 
cannot. Thinner and thinner they grow ; plaintive 
and more plaintive her sweet voice. 

" Dear Bessy" — and your tones tremble ; you feel 
that she is on the edge of the grave. Can you pluck 
her back } Can endearments stay her ? Business is 
heavy, away from the loved child ; home, you go, to 
fondle while yet time is left — but t/ds time you are 
too late. She is gone. She cannot hear you : she 
cannot thank you for the violets you put within her 
stiff white hand. 

And then — the grassy mound — the cold shadow of 
head-stone ! 



Ashe s — Signifying Desolation. 41 

The vviud, growing with the night, is rattling at the 
window panes, and whistles dismally. I wipe a tear, 
and in the interval of niy Reverie, thank God, that 
I am no such mourner. 

But gaiety, snail-footed, creeps back to the house- 
hold. All is bright again ;— 

the violet Led 's not sweeter • 



Than the delicious breath marriage sends forth. 

Her lip is rich and full ; her cheek delicate as a 
flower. Her frailty doubles your love. 

And the little one she clasps — frail too — too frail; 
the boy you had set your hopes and heart on. You 
have watched him growing, ever prettier, ever win- 
ning more and more upon your sonl. The love you 
bore to him when he first lisped names — your name 
and hers — has doubled in strength now that he asks 
innocently to be taught of this, or that, and promises 
you by that quick curiosity that flashes in his eye, a 
mind full of intelligence. 

And some hair-breadth escape by sea, or flood, 
that he perhaps may have had — which unstrung your 
soul to such tears, as you pi-ay God may be spared 
you again — has endeared the little fellow to your 
heart, a thousand fold. 

And, now with his pale sister in the grave, aU 



42 Reveries OF a Bachelor. 

that love has come away from the mound, where 
worms feast, and centers on the hoy. 

How you watch the storms lest they harm him ! 
How often you steal to his bed late at night, and lay 
your hand lightly upon the brow, where the curls 
cluster thick, risinjr and fallino; with the throbbing 

7 O o O 

temples, and watch, for minutes together, the little 
lips half parted, and listen — your ear close to them 
— if the breathing be regular and sweet ! 

But the day comes — the night rather — when you 
can catch no breathing. 

Aye, put your hair away, — compose yourself — lis- 
ten again. 

No, there is nothing ! 

Put your hand nov to his brow, — damp indeed — 
but not with healthful night-sleep ; it is not your 
hand, no, do not deceive yourself — it is your loved 
boy's foi-ehead that is so cold ; and your loved boy 
will never speak to you again — never play again — he 
is dead ! 

Oh, the tears — the tears ; what blessed things are 
tears ! Never fear now to let them fall on his fore- 
head, or his lip, lest you waken him ! — Clasp him — 
clasp him harder — you cannot hurt, you cannot wa- 
ken him ! Lay him down, gently or not, it is the 
game ; he is stiff ; he is stark and cold. 

But courage is elastic ; il is our pride It recov- 



Ashe s — S ignifving Desolation. 43 

ers itself easier, thought I, than these embers ■will 
get into blaze again. 

But courage, and patience, and faith, and hope 
have their limit. Blessed be the man who escape? 
such trial as will determine limit ! 

To a lone man it comes not near ; for how can 
trial take hold where there is nothing by which to 
try ? 

A funeral .' You reason with philosophy. A 
grave yard ? You read Hervey and muse upon the 
wall. A friend dies ? You sigh, you pat your dog, 
— it is over. Losses ? You retrench — you light 
your pipe— it is forgotten. Calumny r You lau2;h 
— you sleep. 

But with that childless wife clinging to you in love 
and sorrow — what then .' 

Can you take down Seneca now, and coolly blow 
the dust from the leaf-tops .' Can you crimp your 
lip with Voltaire .' Can you smoke idly, your feet 
dangling with the ivies, your thoughts all waving 
fancies upon a church-yaid wall — a wall that borders 
the grave of your boy .'' 

Can you amuse yourself by turning stinging Mar- 
tial into rhyme ? Can you pat your dog, and seeing 
him wakeful and kind, say, " it is enough .?" Can 
you sneer at calumny, and sit by your fire dozing } 

Blessed, thought I again, is the man who escapes 



44 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

such trial as will measure the limit of patience and 
the limit of courage ! 

But the trial comes : — colder and colder were 
growing the embers. 

That wife, over whom your love broods, is fading. 
Not beauty fading ; — that, now that your heart is 
wrapped in her being, would be nothing. 

She sees with quick eye your dawning apprehen- 
sion, and she tries hard to make that step of hers 
elastic. 

Your trials and your loves together have centered 
your affections. They are not now as when you 
were a lone man, wide ?pread and superficial. They 
have caught from domestic attachments a finer tone 
and touch. They cannot shoot out tendrils into bar- 
ren world-soil and suck up thence strengthening nu- 
triment. They have grown under the forcing-glass 
of home-roof, they will not now bear exposure. 

You do not now look men in the face as if a heart- 
bond was linking yuu — as if a community of feeling 
lay between. There is a heart-bond that absorbs all 
others ; there is a community that monopolizes your 
feeling. When the heart lay wide open, before it 
had grown upon, and closed around particular ob- 
jects, it could take strength and cheer, from a hun- 
dred connections that now seem colder than ioe 



Ashe s — S ; j n i f y i n g Desolation. 45 

And now tlios) particular oljects — alas for you I — 
arc failing. 

What anxiety pursues you ! How you struggle to 
fancy — there is no danger ; how she struggles to per- 
suade you — there is no danger ! 

How it grates now on your ear — the toil and tur- 
moil of the city ! It was music when you were 
alone ; it was pleasant even, when from the din you 
were elaborating comforts for the cherished objects ; 
— when you had such sweet escape as evening drew 
on. 

Now it maddens you to see the world careless 
while you are steeped in care. They hustle you in 
the street ; they smilj at you across the table ; they 
bow carelessly over the way ; they do not know what 
canker is at your heart. 

The undertaker comes with his bill for the dead 
boy's funeral, lie knows your grief; he is respect- 
ful. You bless hiiu in your soul. You wi^h tlie 
laughing street-goers were all undertakers. 

Your eye follows the physician as he leaves your 
house : is he wise, you ask yourself; is he prudent ? 
is he the best } Did he never fail — is he never for- 
getful ? 

And now the hand that touches yours, is it no 
thinner — no whiter than yesterday .? Sunny days 
come when she revive-; ; colour comes back ; she 



46 Reveries OF A Bach :;:-.0R. 

breathes freer ; she picks flowers ; she meets you 
with a smile : hope iivos again. 

But the next day of storm she is fallen. She 
cannot talk even ; she presses your hand. 

You hurry away from business before your 
time. What matter for clients — who is to reap the 
rewards ? What matter for fame — whose eye will it 
brighten ? What matter for riches — whose is tho 
inheritance ? 

You find her propped with pillows ; she is looking 
over a little picture-book bethumbed by the dear boy 
she has lost. She hides it in her chair ; she has pity 
on you. 

■ Another day of revival, when tho spring sun 

shines, and flowers open out of doors ; she leans on 
your arm, and strolls into the gai'den wh^re the first 
birds are singing. Listen to them with her ; — what 
memories are in bird-songs ! You need not shudder 
at her tears — they are tears of Thanksgiving, Press 
the hand that lies light upon your arm, and you, too, 
thank God, while yet you may ! 

You are early home — mid-afternoon. Your step 
is not light ; it is heavy, terrible. 

They have sent for you. 

She is lying down ; her eyes half closed ; ter 
breathing long and interrupted. 



Ashes — Signifying D e s o i. a t i c n . 17 

She hears you ; her eye opens ; you put your 
hand in hers ; yours trembles ; — hers does not. Her 
lips move ; it is your name. 

*"Ee strong", she says, " God will help you !' 
She presses harder your hand : — " Adieu !" 
A long breath — another ; — you are alone again. 
No tears now ; poor man ! You cannot find them ! 

Again home early. There is a smell of var- 



nish in your house. A coffin is there ; they have 
clothed the body in decent grave clothes, and the 
undertaker is screwing down the lid, slipping round 
on tip-toe. Does he fear to waken her ? 

He asks you a simple question about the inscrip- 
tion upon the plate, rubbing it with his coat cuff. 
Yon look him straight in the eye ; you motion to the 
door ; you dare not speak. 

He takes up his hat and glides out stealthful as a 
cat. 

The man has done his work well for all. It is a 
nice coffin — a very nice coffin ! Pass your hand over 
it — how smooth ! 

Some sprigs of mignionette are lying carelessly in 
a little gilt-edged saucer. She loved mignionette. 

It is a good staunch table the coffin rests on ; — 
it is your table ; yoi are a housekeeper — a man of 
family ! 



48 PtEVEHIES OF A BaCHELOR, 

Aye, of family ! — keep down outcry, or the nurse 
will h'' in. Look over at the pinched features ; is 
this all that is left of her ? And where is your heart 
now ? No, don't thrust your nails into your hands, 
nor mangle your lip, nor grate your teeth together. 
If you could only weep ! 

Another day. The coffin is gone out. The 

stupid mourners have wept — what idle tears ! She, 
with your crushed heart, has gone out ! 

Will you have pleasant evenings at your home 
now . 

Go into your parlor that your prim housekeeper 
has made comfortable with clean hearth and blaze of 
sticks. 

Sit down in your chair ; there is another velvet- 
cushioned one, over against yours — empty. You 
press your fingers on your eye-balls, as if you 
would press out something that hurt tho brain ; but 
you cannot. Your head loans upon your hand ; your 
eyes rest upon the flashing blaze. 

Ashes always come after blaze. 

Go now into the room where she was sick — softly, 
lest the prim housekeeper come after. 

They have put new dimity upon her chair ; they 
have hung new curtains over the bed. They have 
removed from the stand its phials, and silver bell ; 
they have put a little vase of flowers in their place j 



Ashe s — S ignifying DesolatioI'I. 49 

tho perfume will not offend the gick sense now. 
They have half opened the window, that the room so 
long closed may have air. It will not be too cold. 

She is not there. 

Oh, God ! — thou who dost temper the wind to 

the shorn lamb — be kind ! 

The embers were dark ; I stirred them ; there 
was no sign of life. My dog was asleep. The clock 
in my tenant's chamber had struck one. 

I dashed a tear or two from my eyes ; — how they 
came there I know not. I half ejaculated a prayer 
of thanks, that such desolation had not yet come nigh 
me ; and a prayer of hope — that it might never come. 

In a half hour more, 1 was sleeping soundly. My 
reverie was ended. 



0ccou5 RcDcrie. 



Bta deal an'ii :7lntljrante. 



BY A CITY GRATE. 



BLESSKD be letters ! — thcj are the monitors, 
they are ulso the comforters, and they are the 
only true heart-talkers ! You speech and their 
speeches, are conventional ; they are moulded by 
circumstance ; they are suggested by the observation, 
remark, and influence of the parties to whom the 
speaking is addressed, or by whom it may be over- 
heard. 

Your truest thought is mo(Jified half through its 
utterance by a look, a sign, a smile, or a sneer. It 
is not individual ; it is not integral : it is social and 
mixed, — half of you, and half of others. It bends, it 
Bways, it multiplies, it retires, and it advances, as the 
talk of others presses, relaxes, or quickens. 



64 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

But it is not so of Letters : — there you are, with 
only the soulless pen, and the snow-white, virgin 
paper. Your soul is measuring itself by itself, and 
saying its own sayings : there are no sneers to modify 
its utterance, — no scowl to scare, — nothing is present, 
but you, and your thought. 

Utter it then freely — write it down — stamp it — 
burn it in the ink ! There it is, a true soul-print ! 

Oh, the glory, the freedom, the passion of a letter ! 
It is worth all the lip-talk in the world. Do you say, 
it is studied, made up, acted, rehearsed, contrived, 
artistic ? 

Let me see it then ; let me run it over ; tell me 
age, sex, circumstance, and I will tell you if it be 
studied or real ; — if it hi tin merest lip-slang put 
into words, or hear' -talk bla.'iing on the paper. 

I have a little pacquet, not very large, tied up with 
narrow crimson ribbon, now soiled with frequent 
handling, which far into some winter's night, I take 
down from its nook upon my shelf, and untie, and 
open, and run over, with such sorrow, and such joy, — 
such tears and such smiles, as I am sure make me for 
weeks after, a kinder, and holier man. 

There ai-e in this little pacquet, letters in the 
familiar hand of a mother what gentle admo- 
nition ; — what tender aifection ! — God have mercy on 
him who outlives the tears that such admonitions, and 



Beside a City Grate. 55 

such affection call up to the eye ! There are others 
in the budget, in the delicate, and unformed hand of 
a loved, and lost sister ; — written when she, and you 
were full of glee, and the best mirth of youthfulness ; 
does it harm you to recall that mirthfulness ? or to 
trace again, for the hundredth time, that scrawling 
postscript at the bottom, with its ^'s so carefully 
dotted, and its gigantic fs so carefully crossed, by the 
childish hand of a little brother ? 

I have added latterly to that pacquet of letters ; I 
almost need a new and longer ribbon ; the old one is 
getting too short. Not a few of these new, and 
cherished letters, a former Reverie* has brought to 
me ; not letters of cold praise, saying it was well 
done, artfully executed, prettily imagined — no such 
thing : but letters of sympathy — of sympathy which 
means sympathy — the nu6r\fil and the aw. 

It would be cold, and dastardly work to copy 
them ; I am too selfish for that. It is enough to say 
that they, the kind writers, have seen a heart in the 
Reverie — have felt that it was real, true. They 
know it ; a secret influence has told it. What 
matters it pray, if literally, there was no wife, and no 
dead child, and no coffin in the house ? Is not 

* The first Reverie — Smoke, Flame, and Ashes, was 
published some months previous to this, in the Southern 
Literary Messenger. 



56 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

feeling, feeling ; and heart, heart ? Are not these 
fancies thronging on my brain, bringing tears to my 
eyes, bringing joy to my soul, as living, as anything 
human can be living ? What if they have no material 
type — no objective form ? All that is crude, — a 
mere reduction of ideality to sense, — a transformation 
of the spiritual to the earthy, — a levelling of soul to 
matter. 

Are we not creatures of thought and passion ? Is 
any thing about us more earnest than that same 
thought and passion ? Is there any thing more 
real, — more characteristic of that great and (Jim 
destiny to which we are born, and which may be 
written down in that terrible word — Forever .'' 

Let those who will then, sneer at what in their 
wisdom they call untruth — at what is false, because 
it has no material presence : this does not create 
falsity ; would to Heaven that it did ! 

And yet, if there was actual, material truth 
superadded to Reverie, would such objectors sympa- 
thize the more ? No ! — a thousand times, no ; the 
heart that has no sympathy with thoughts and 
feelings that scorch the soul, is dead also — whatever 
its mocking tears, and gestures may say — to a coffin, 
or a grave ! 

Let them pass, and we will come back to these 
cherished letters. 



Beside a City Grate. 57 

A mother, who has lost a cliild, has, she says, shod 
a tear — not one, but many — over the dead boy's 
coldness. And another, who has not lost, but who 
trembles lest she lose, has found the words failing as 
she read, and a dim, sorrow-borne mist, spreading 
over the page. 

Another, yet rejoicing in all those family ties, that 
make life a charm, has listened nervously to careful 
reading, until the husband is called home, and the 
cofSu is in the house. — " Stop !" — she says ; and a 
gush of tears tells the rest. 

Yet the cold critic will say — " it was artfully 
done." A curse on him ! — it was not art : it was 
nature. 

Another, a young, fresh, healthful girl-mind, has 
seen something in the love-picture — albeit so weak — 
of truth ; and has kindly believed that it must be 
earnest. Aye, indeed is it, fair, and generous one, — ■ 
earnest as life and hope ! Who indeed with a heart 
at all, that has not yet slipped away irreparably, and 
forever from the shores of youth — from that fairy land 
which young enthusiasm creates, and over which 
bright dreams hover — but knows it to be real ? And 
so such things will be real, till hopes are dashed, and 
Death is come. 

Another a father, has laid down the book ia 
tears 



58 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

— God bless them all ! How far better this, than 
the cold praise of newspaper paragraphs, or the 
critically contrived approval of colder friends ! 

Let me gather up these letters, carefully, — to be 
read when the heart is faint, and sick of all that there 
is unrea^, and selfish in the world. Let me tie them 
together, with a new, and longer bit of ribbon — not 
by a love knot, that is too hard — but by an easy 
slipping knot, that so I may get at them the better. 
And now, they are all together, a snug pacquet, and 
we will label them, not sentimentally, (I pity the one 
who thinks it !) but earnestly, and in the best mean- 
ing of the term — Souvenirs du Cceur. 

Thanks to my first Reverie, Avliich has added to 
encb a treasure ! 

— And now to my Second Reverie. 

I am no longer in the country. The fields, the 
trees, the brooks are far away from me, and yet they 
are very present. A letter from my tenant — how 
different from those other letters ! — lies upon my 
table, telling me what fields he has broken up for the 
autumn grain, and how many beeves he is fattening, 
and how the potatoes are turning out. 

But I am in a garret of the city. From my 
window I look over a mass of crowded house-tops — 
moralizing often upon the scene, but in a strain too 
long, and sombre to be sot down here. In place of 



Beside A City Grat^. 59 

the wide country chimney, with its iron fii 9-dogs, is a 
snug grate, where the maid makes me a ire in the 
morning, and rekindles it in the afternoon. 

I am usually fairly seated in my chair — a cozUy 
stuffed office chair — by five or six o'clock of the 
evening. The fire has been newly made, perhaps an 
hour before : first, the maid drops a withe of paper 
in the bottom of the grate, then a stick or two of pine- 
wood, and after it a hod of Liverpool coal ; so that by 
the time I am seated for the evening, the sea-coal is 
fairly in a blaze. 

When this has sunk to a level with the second bar 
of the grate, the maid replenishes it with a hod of 
Anthracite ; and I sit musing and reading, while the 
new coal warms and kindles — not leaving my place, 
until it has sunk to the third bar of the grate, which 
marks my bed-time. 

I love these accidental measures of the hours, which 
belong to you, and your life, and not to the world. 
A watch is no more the measure of your time, than 
of the time of your neighbors ; a church clock is as 
public, and vulgar as a church-warden. I would as 
soon think of hiring the parish sexton to make my 
bed, as to regulate my time by the parish clock. 

A shadow that the sun casts upon your carpet, or 
a streak of light on a slated roof yonder, or the 
burning of your fire, are pleasant time-keepers, — full 



60 Reveries OF 4 Bachelor. 

of presence, full of companionship, and full of the 
warning — time is passing ! 

In the summer season I have even measured my 
reading, and my night-watch, by the burning of a 
taper ; and I have scratched upon the handle to the 
little bronze taper-holder, that meaning passage of the 
New Testament, — A^fl yaq egx^^'^'- — the night 
Cometh ! 

But I must get upon my Reverie : — it was a 
drizzly evening ; I had worked hard during the day, 
and had drawn my boots — thrust my feet into 
slippers — thrown on a Turkish loose dress, and Greek 
cap — souvenirs to me of other times, and other 
places — and sat watching the lively, uncertain, yellow 
play of the bitumina'is flame. 



I. 

Sea-Coal. 

IT is like a flirt — mused I ; — lively, uncertain, 
bright-colored, waving here and there, melting 
the coal into black shapeless mass, making foul, sooty- 
smoke, and pasty, trashy residuum ! Yet withal, — 
pleasantly sparkling, dancing, prettily waving, and 
leaping like a roebuck from point to point. 

How like a flirt ! And yet is not this tossing 
caprice of girlhood, to which I liken my sea-coal 
flame, a native play of life, and belonging by nature 
to the play-time of life ? Is it not a sort of essential 
fire-kindling to the weightier and truer passions — even 
as Jenny puts the soft coal first, the better to kindle 
the anthracite ? Is it not a sort of necessary con- 



62 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

sumption of young vapors, which float in the soul, 
and which is left thereafter the purer ? Is there not 
a stage somewhere in every man's youth, for just 
such waving, idle heart-blaze, which means nothing, 
yet which must be got over ? 

Lamartine says somewhere, very prettily, that 
there is more of quick running sap, and floating 
shade in a young tree ; but more of fire in the heart 
of a sturdy oak : — II y a plus de sitvc folk et d'^omire 
flottante dans les jewnes plants de la forU ; it y a 
plus de feu, dans le viciix cmnr du ckene. 

Is Lamartine playing off his prettiness of expres- 
sion, dressing up with his poetry, — making a good 
conscience against the ghost of some accusing 
Grraziella, or is there truth in the matter ? 

A man who has seen sixty years, whether widower 
or bachelor, may well put such sentiment into words : 
it feeds his wasted heart with hope ; it renews the 
exultation of youth by the plcasantest of equivoca- 
tion, and the most charming of self-confidence. But 
after all, is it not true ? Is not the heart like new 
blossoming field-plants, whose first flowers are half 
formed, one-sided perhaps, but by-and-by, in maturity 
of season, putting out wholesome, well-formed 
blossoms, that will hold their leaves long and bravely ? 

Bulwer in his story of the Caxtons, has counted 
first heart-flights mere fancy-passages — a dalliance 



SeaCoal. 63 

with the breezes of love — which pass, and leave 
healthful heart appetite. Half the reading world has 
read the story of Trevanion and Pisistratus. But 
Bulwer is — past ; his heart-life is used up — ejpnisc. 
Such a man can very safely rant about the cool 
judirmcnt of after years. 

Where does Shakspeare put the unripe heart- 
age : — All of it before the ambition, that alone makes 
the hero-soul. The Shakspeare man 'sighs like a 
furnace,' before he s-tretchcs his arm to achieve the 
bauble, reputation.' 

Yet Shakspeare has moted a soul-love, mature and 
ripe, without any young furnace sighs to Desdemona 
and Othello. Cordelia, the sweetest of his play 
creations, loves without any of the mawkish matter, 
which makes the whining love of a Juliet. And 
Florizel in the Winter's Tale, says to Perdita, in the 
true spirit of a most sound heart — 

My desires 
Run not before mine honor, nor my wishes 
Burn hotter than my faith. 

ITow is it with Hector and Andromache .' — no sea- 
coal blaze, but one that is constant, enduring, perva- 
ding : a pair of hearts full of esteem, and best love,— 
good, honest, and sound. 



64 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

Look now at Adam and Eve, in God's presence, 
with Milton for showman. Shall we quote by this 
sparkling blaze, a gem from the Paradise Lost ? We 
will hum it to ourselves — what Raphael sings to 
Adam — a classic song. 

Him, serve and fear 1 

Of other creatures, as Him pleases best 
Wherever placed, let Him dispose ; joy thou 
In what he gives to thee, this Paradise 
And thy fair Eve ! 

And again : 

Love refines 

The thoughts, and heart enlarges : hath his seat 

In reason, and is judicious : is the scale 

By which to Heavenly love thou mays't ascend ! 

None of the playing sparkle in this love, which 
belongs to the flame of my sea-coal fire, that is now 
dancing, lively as a cricket. But on looking about 
my garret chamber, I can see nothing that resembles 
the archangel Raphael, or ' thy fair Eve.' 

There is a degree of moisture about the sea-coal 
flame, which with the most earnest of my musing, I 
find it impossible to attach to that idea of a waving, 
sparkling heart which my fire suggests. A damp 



Sea-Coal. 65 

heart must be a foul thing to be sure ! But Tvlioever 
heard of one ? 

Wordsworth somewhere la the Excursion, says : — 

The good de first, 
And they whose hearts are dry as summer dust 
Burn to the socket ! 

What, ia the iiaiiio of iljual Mount, is a dry 
heart? A dusty one, I can conceive of: a bache- 
lor's heart must be somewhat dusty, as he nears the 
sixtieth summer of his pilgrimage ; — and hung over 
with cobwebs, in which sit such watchful gray old 
spiders as Avarice, and Selfishness, forever on the 
look out for such bottle-green fiies as Lust. 

" I will never" — said I — griping at the elbows 
of my chair, — " live a bachelor till sixty : — never, so 
surely as there is hope in man, or charity in woman, 
or faith in both !" 

And with that thought, my heart leaped about in 
playful coruscations, even like the flame of the sea- 
coal ; — rising, and wrapping round old and tender 
memories, and images that were present to me, — 
trying to cUng, and yet no sooner fastened, than off- 
dancing again, riotous in its exultation — -a succession 
of heart-sparkles, blazing, and going out ! 

— And is there not — mused I, — a portion of this 



66 EEVbiRIESOF A Ba3HKL0R 

world, forever blazing in just such lively sparkles , 
waving here and there as the air-currents fan them ? 

Take for instance your heart of sentiment, and 
quick sensibility, a weak, warm-working heart, flying 
off in tangents of unhappy influence, unguided by 
prudence, and perhaps virtue. There is a paper by 
Mackenzie in the Mirror for April, 1780, which sets 
this untoward sensibility in a strong liglit. 

And the more it is indulged, the more strong and 
binding such a habit of sensibility becomes. Poor 
Mackenzie himself must have sufFared thus ; you 
cannot read his books without feeling it ; your eye, 
in spite of you, runs over with his sensitive griefs, 
while you are half-ashamed of his success at picture- 
making. It is a terrible inheritance ; and one that a 
strong man or woman will study to subdue : it is a 
vain sea-coal sparkling, which will count no good. 
The world is made of much hard, flinty substance, 
against which your better, and holier thoughts will be 
striking fire ; — see to it, that the spa ks do not burn 
you! 

But what a happy, careless life belongs to this 
Bachelorhood, in which you may strike out boldly 
right and left ! Your heart is not bou ad to another 
which may be full of only sickly vapors of feeling ; 
nor is it frozen to a cold, man's heart under a silk 
boddice — knowina; uothins; of tL^nderuess but the 



S E A - C O A L 67 

name, to prate of; and notliing of soul-confidence, 
but clumsy confession. And if in your careless 
out-goings of feeling, you get here, only a little lip 
vapidity in return ; be sure that you will find, else- 
where, a true heart utterance. This last you will 
cherish in your inner soul — a nucleus for a new 
group of affections ; and the other will pass with a 
whiff" of your cigar. 

Or if your feelings are touched, struck, hurt, who 
is the wiser, or the worse, but you only ? And have 
you not the whole skein of your heart-life in your 
own fingers to wind, or unwind, in what shape you 
please .'' Shake it or twine it, or tangle it, by the 
light of your fire, a>; you fancy best. He is a weak 
man who cannot twist and weave the threads of his 
feeling — however fine, however tangled, howevei 
strained, or however strong — into the great cable of 
Purpose, by which he lies moored to his life o.' 
Action. 

Reading is a great, and happy disentangler of al] 
those knotted snarls — those extravagant vagarie.«, 
which belong to a heart sparkling with sensibility ; 
but the reading must be cautiously directed. There 
is old, placid Burton when your soul is weak, and its 
digestion of life's humors is bad ; ihere is Cowper 
when your spirit runs into kindly, half-sad, religious 
musing ; there is Crabbe when you would shake ofl 



68 Reveries OF iBacheldr. 

vagary, by a little handling of sharp actualities. 
There is Voltaire, a homeopathic doctor, whom you 
can read when you want to make a play of life, and 
crack jokes at Nature, and be witty with Destiny; 
there is Rousseau, when you want to loso yourself in 
a mental dream-land, and be beguiled by the harmony 
of soul-music and soul-culture. 

And when you would shake off this, and be 
sturdiest among the battlers for hard, world-success, 
and be forewarned of rocks against which you must 
surely smite — read Bolingbroke ; — run over the 
letters of Lyttletou ; read, and think of what you 
read, in the cracking lines of Rochefoucauld. How 
he sums us up in his stinging words ! — how he puts 
the scalpel between the nerves — yet he never hurts ; 
for he is dissecting dead matter. 

If you are in a genial careless mood, who is better 
than such extemporizers of feeling and nature — good- 
hearted fellows — as Sterne and Fielding .-' 

And then again, there are Milton and Isaiah, to 
lift up one's soul until it touches cloud-land, and you 
wander with their guidance, on swift feet, to the very 
gates of Heaven. 

But this sparkling sensibility to one struggling 
under infirmity, or with grief or poverty, is very 
dreadfjil. The soul is too nicely and keenly hinged 
to be wrenched without mischief. How it shrinks, 



S E . - C O A L . 69 

like a hurt child, from all that is vulgar, harsh, and 
crude ! Alas, for such a man ! — he will be buffeted, 
from beginning to end ; his life will be a sea of 
troubles. The poor victim of his own quick spirit 
he wanders with a great shield of doubt hung before 
him, so that none, not even friends can sec the good- 
ness of such kindly qualities as belong to him. 
Poverty, if it comes upon him, he wrestles with in 
secret, with strong, frenzied struggles. He wraps 
his scant clothes about him to keep him from the 
cold ; and eyes the world, as if every creature in it 
was breathing chill blasts at him, from every opened 
mouth. He threads the crowded ways of the city, 
proud in his griefs, vain iu his weakness, not stopping 
to do good. Bulwer, in the New Timon,has painted 
in a pair of stinging Pope-like lines, this feeling in a 
woman : — 

Her vengeful pride, a kind of madness grown, 

She hugged her wrongs, her sorrow was her throne I 

Cold picture ! yet the heart was sparkling under 
it, like my sea- coal fire ; lifting and blazing, and 
lighting and falling, — but with no object ; and only 
such little heat as begins and ends within. 

Those fine sensibilities, ever active, are chasing 



/O IlEVEnii:soF a Bachelor. 

and observing all ; they catch a huo from what the 
dull and callous pass by unnoticed, — because unknown. 
They blunder at the great variety of the world's 
opinions ; they see tokens of belief, where others see 
none. That delicate organization is a curse to a 
man ; and yet poor fool, he does not see where his 
cure lies ; he wonders at his griefs, and has never 
reckoned with himself their source. He studies 
others, without studying himself. He eats the leaves 
that sicken, and never plucks up the root that will 
cure. 

With a woman it is worse ; with her, this delicate 
susceptibility is like a frail flower, that quivers at every 
rough blast of heaven ; her own delicacy wounds her ; 
her highest charm is perverted to a curse. 

She listens with fear ; she reads with trembling ; 
she looks with dread. Her sympathies give a tone, 
like the harp of iEolus, to the slightest breath. Her 
sensibility lights up, and quivers and falls, like the 
fiame of a sea-coal fire. 

If she loves — (and may not a Bachelor reason on 
this daintiest of topics) — her love is a gushing, wavy 
flame, lit up with hope, that has only a little kindling 
matter to light it ; and this soon burns out. Yet 
intense sensibility will persuade her that the flame 
still scorches. She will mistake the annoyance of 
affection unrequited f^r the sting of a passion, that 



S E A - C o A : . 71 

she fancies still burns. She docs not look deep 
enough to see that the passion is gone, and the 
shocked sensitiveness emits only faint, yellowish 
sparkles in its place ; her high-wrought organization 
makes those sparks seem a veritable flame. 

With her, judgment, prudence, and discretion are 
cold measured terms, which have no meaning, except 
as they attach to the actions of others. Of her own 
acts, she never predicates them ; feeling is much too 
high, to allow her to suhmit to any such obtrusive 
guides of conduct. She needs disappointment to 
teach her truth ; — to teach that all is not gold that 
glitters — to teach that all warmth does not blaze. 
But let her beware how she sinks under any fancied 
disappointments : she who sinks under real disappoint- 
ment, lacks philosophy ; but she who sinks under a 
fancied one, lacks purpose. Let her flee as the 
plague, such brooding thoughts as she will love to 
cherish ; let her spurn dark fancies as the visitants of 
hell ; let the soul rise with the blaze of new-kindled, 
active, and world-wide emotions, and so brighten into 
steady and constant flame. Let her abjure such 
poets as Cowper, or Byron, or even Wordsworth ; and 
if she must poetize, let her lay her mind to such 
manly verse as Pope's, or to such sound and ringing 
organry as Comus. 

My fire was getting dull, and I thru?t in the poker. 



72 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

it started up on tlia instant into a Imndred little 
an^ry tongues of flame. 

— Just so — thought I — the over-sensitive heart 
once cruelly disturbed, will fling out a score of 
flaming passions, darting here, and darting there, — 
half-smoke, half-flame — love and hate — canker and 
joy — wild in its madness, not knowing whither its 
sparks are flying. Once break roughly upon the 
afifections, or even the fancied afi"ections of such a 
soul, and you breed a tornado of maddened action — 
a whirlwind of fire that hisses, and sends out jets of 
wild, impulsive combustion, that make the bystand- 
ers, — even those most friendly — stand aloof, until the 
storm is past. 

But this is not all that the dashing flame of my 
sea-coal suggests. 

How like a flirt ! — mused I again, recurring to 

my first thought — so lively, yet uncertain ; so bright, 
yet so flickering ! Your true flirt plays with spar- 
kles ; her heart, much as there is of it, spends itself 
in sparkles ; she measures it to sparkle, and habit 
grows into nature, so that anon, it can only sparkle. 
How carefully she cramps it, if tlie flames show too 
great a heat ; how dexterously she flings its blaze here 
and there ; how coyly she subdues it ; how winningly 
she lights it ! 

All this is the entire reverse of the unpremeditated 



S 1-. A -Coal 73 

dartings of tlie soul at wliidi I bavo been looking ; 
sensibility scorns heart-ciirbings, and heart-teachings ; 
sensibility enquires not — how much ? but only — 
where ? 

Your true flirt has a coarse-grained soul ; well 
modulated and well tutored, but there is no fineness 
in it. All its native fineness is made coarse, by 
coarse efforts of the will. True feeling is a rustic 
vulgarity, the flirt does not tolerate ; she counts its 
healthiest and most honest manifestation, all sentiment. 
Yet she will play you off a pretty string of sentiment, 
which she has gathered fioiu the poets ; she adjusts 
it prettily as a Ghobelin weaver adjusts the colors in 
his tapis. She shades it off delightfully ; there are 
no bold contrasts, but a most artistic mellow of 
nuances. 

She smiles like a wizzard, and jingles it with a 
laugh, such as tolled the poor home-bound Ulysses 
to the Circean bower. She has a cast of Ihe head, 
apt and artful as the most dexterous cast of the best 
tfout-killing rod. Her woi'ds sparkle, and flow 
hurriedly, and with the prettiest doubleness of meaning. 
Naturalne.ss she copies, and she scorns. She accuses 
herself of a single expression or regard, which nature 
prompts. She prides herself on her schooling. She 
measures her wit by the triumphs of her art ; she 
chuckles over her own falsity to herself. And if by 



74 Reveries of a BACHffx,OR. 

chance her soul — such germ as is left of it — betrays 
her into untoward confidence, she condemns herself, 
as if she had committed crime. 

She is always gay, because she has no depth of 
feeling to be stii-red. The brook that runs shallow 
over a hard pebbly bottom always rustles. She is 
light-hearted, because her heart floats in sparkles — 
like my sea-coal fire. She counts on marriage, not 
as the great absorbent of a heart's-love, and life, but 
as a happy, feasible, and orderly conventionality, to 
be played with, and kept at distance, and finally to be 
accepted as a cover for the faint and tawdry sparkles 
of an old and cherished heartlessness. 

She will not pine under any regrets, because she 
has no appreciation of any loss : she will not chafe at 
indiflference, because it is her art ; she will not be 
worried with jealousies, because she is ignorant of 
love. With no conception of the soul in its strength 
and fulness, she sees no lack of its demands. A . 
thrill, she does not know ; a passion, she cannot 
imagine ; joy is a name ; grief is another ; and Life 
with its crowding scenes of love, aud bitterness, is a 
play upon the stage. 

I think it is Madame Dudevant who says, in some- 
thing like the same connection : — Les hihoux ne 
connaissant pas le chemln 'par oil les aic/les vont au 
soliel. 



Sea-Co. VL. 75 

Poor Ned i — mused I, looking at the play of 

the fire — was a victim and a conqueror. He was a 
man of a full, strong nature — not a little impulsive — 
with action too full of earnestness for most of men to 
see its drift. He had known little of what is called 
the world ; he was fresh in feeling and high of hope ; 
he had been encircled always by friends who loved 
him, and who, may be, flattered him. Scarce had he 
entered upon the tangled life of the city, before he met 
with a sparkling face and an airy step, that stirred 
something in poor Ned, that he had never felt before. 
With him, to feel wfes to act. He was not one to be 
despised ; for notwithstanding he wore a country air, 
and the awkwardness of a man who has yet the bien- 
seance of social life before him, he had the soul, the 
courage, and the talent of a strong man. Little 
gifted in the knowledge of face-play, he easily 
mistook those coy manoeuvres of a sparkling heart, 
for something kindred to his own true emotions. 

She was proud of the attentions of a man %vho 
carried a mind in his brain ; and flattered poor Ned 
almost into servility. Ned had no friends to counsel 
liim ; or if he had them, his impulses would have 
blinded him. Never was dodger more artful at tho 
Olympic Games than the Peggy of Ned's heart- 
affection. He was charmed, beguiled, entranced. 
Vhen Ned spoke of love, she staved it off with 



76 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

the prettiest of sly looks that only bewildered him the 
more. A charming creature to be sure ; coy as a 
dove ! 

So ho went on, poor fool, until one day — he told 
me of it with the blood mounting to his temples, and 
his eye shooting flame — he suffered his feelings to run 
out in passionate avowal, — entreaty, — everything. 
She gave a pleasant, noisy laugh, and manifested — 
such pretty surprise ! 

He was looking for the intense glow of passion ; 
and lo, there was nothing but the shifting sparkle of 
a sea-coal flame. 

I wrote him a letter of condolence — for I was his 
senior by a year ; — " my dear fellow," said I, " diet 
yourself; you can find greens at the up-town market; 
eat a little fish with 3'our dinner ; abstain from heat- 
ing drinks : don't put too much butter to your 
cauliflower ; read one of Jeremy Taylor's sermons, 
and translate all the quotations at sight ; run care- 
fully over that exquisite picture of Geo. Dandin in 
your Moliere, and my word for it, in a week you will 
be a sound man." 

He was too angry to reply ; but eighteen months 
thereafter I got a thick, three-sheeted letter, with a 
dove upon the seal, telling me that he was as happy 
as a king: he said he had married a good-hearted, 
domestic, loving wife, who was as lovely as a June 



H C A - C O A L . 77 

day, and tbat their baby, not three months old, was 
as bright as a spot of June day sunshine on the grass. 

— What a tender, delicate, loving wife — mused I — 
such flashing, flaming flirt must in the end make ; — 
the prostitute of fashion ; the bauble of fifty hearts 
idle as hei-s ; the shifting make-piece of a stage scene ; 
the actress, now in peasant, and now in princely 
petticoats ! How it would cheer an honest soul to 
call her — his ! What a culmination of his heart-life ; 
what a rich dream-land to be realized ! 

Bah ! and I thrust the poker into the clotted 

mass of fading coal — just such, and so worthless is the 
used heart of a city flirt ; just so the incessant sparkle 
of her life, and frittering passions, fuses all that is 
sound and combustible, into black, sooty, shapeless 
residuum. 

When I marry a flirt, I will buy second-hand 
clothes of the Jews. 

— Still — mused I — as the flame danced again — 
there is a distinction between coquetry and flirtation. 

A coquette sparkles, but it is more the sparkle of a 
harmless and pretty vanity, than of calculation. It 
is the play of humors in the blood, and not the play 
of purpose at the heart. It will flicker around a true 
soul like the blaze around an omdette au rhunij leav- 
ing the kernel sounder and warmer. 



7S R F. V E U I E S OF A B A C II E L R . 

Coquetry, with all its pranks and leasings, makea 
the spice to your dinner — the mulled wine to your 
supper. It will drive you to desperation, only tc 
bring you back hotter to the fray. Who would 
boast a victory that cost no strategy, and no careful 
disposition of the forces ? Who would bulletin such 
success as my Uncle Toby's, in a back-garden, with 
only the Corporal Trim for assailant ? But let a man 
be very sure that the city is worth the siege ! 

Coquetry whets the appetite ; flirtation depraves 
it. Coquetry is the thorn that guards the rose — 
easily trimmed off when once plucked. Flirtation is 
lijje the slime on water-plants, making them hard to 
handle, and when caught, only to be cherished in 
slimy waters. 

And so, with my eye clinging to the flickering 
blaze, I see in my reverie, a bright one dancing before 
me, with sparkling, coquettish smile, teasing me with 
the prettiest graces in the world ; — and I gro\^ 
maddened between hope and fear, and still watch with 
my whole soul in my eyes ; and see her features by 
and by relax to pity, as a gleam of sensibility comes 
stealing over her spirit ; — and then to a kindly, feeling- 
regard : presently she approaches, — a coy and doubt- 
ful approach — and throws back the ringlets that lie 
over her cheek, and lays her hand — a little bit of 
white hand — timidly upon my strong fingers, — and 



S E \ - C O A L . 79 

turns her head daintily to one side, — and looks up in 
my eyes, as they rest on the playing blaze ; and my 
fingers close fast and passionately over that little 
hand, like a swift night-cloud shrouding the pale tips 
of Dian ; — and my eyes draw nearer and nearer to 
those blue, laughing, pitying, teasing eyes, and my 
arm clasps round that shadowy form, — and uiy lips 

feel a warm breath — growing warmer and warmer 

Just here the maid comes in, and throws upon the 
fire a pan-ful of Anthracite, and my sparkling sea- 
coal reverie is ended. 



II. 

Anthracite. 

IT doc« not burn freely, so I put on the blower. 
Quaint and good-natured Xavier de Maistre* 
would have made, I dare say, a pretty epilogue about 
a sheet-iron blower ; but I cannot. 

I try to bang back the imag3 that belonged to the 
lingering bituminous flame, but with my eyes on that 
dark blower, — how can I ? 

It is the black curtain of destiny which drops down 
before our brightest dreams. How often the phan- 
toms of joy regale us, and dance before us — golden- 
winged, angel-faced, heart-warming, and make an 
Elysium in which the dreaming soul bathes, and feels 
translated to another existence ; and then — sudden aa 

* Voyage autoiti' de Ma Chambre. 



Anthracite. 81 

night, or a cloud — a word, a step, a thought, a mem- 
ory will chase thorn away, like scared deer vanishing 
over a gray horizon of moor-land ! 

I know not justly, if it bo a weakness or a sin to 
create these phantoms that we love, and to group them 
into a paradise — soul-created. But if it is a sin, it is 
a sweet and enchanting sin ; and if it is a weakness, 
it is a strong and stirring weakness. If this heart is 
sick of the falsities that meet it at every hand, and is 
eager to spend that power which nature has ribbed it 
with, on some object worthy of its fulness and depth, — 
shall it not feel a rich relief, — nay more, an exercise 
in keeping with its end, if it flow out — strong as a 
tempest, wild as a rushing river, upon those ideal 
creations, which imagination invents, and which are 
tempered by our best sense of beauty, purity, and 
grace .'' 

Useless, do you say ? Aye, it is as useless as 

the pleasure of looking hour upon hour, over britTht 
landscapes ; it is as useless as the rapt enjoyment of 
listening with heart full and eyes brimming, to such 
music as the Miserere at Rome ; it is as useless as the 
ecstacy of kindling your soul into fervor and love, and 
madness, over pages that reek with genius. 

There are indeed base-moulded souls who know 
nothing of this ; they laugh ; they sneer ; they even 
affect to pity. Just so the Huns under the avenging 



82 Reveries OF A Bachelor. 

Attila, who had been used to foul cookery and steaks 
stewed under their saddles, laughed brutally at the 
spiced banquets of an Apicius i 

No, this phantom-making is no sin ; or if it 

be, it is sinning with a soul so full, so earnest, that it 
can ciy to Heaven cheerily, and sure of a gracious 
hearing — 2;eccrtv^' — mi se?- iconic / 

But my fire is in a glow, a pleasant glow, throwing 
a tranquil, steady light to the farthest corner of my 
garret. How unlike it is, to the flasliing play of the 
sea-coal ! — unlike as an unsteady, uncertain- workino- 
heart to the true and earnest constancy of one cheerful 
and right. 

After all, thought I, give me such a heart ; not bent 
on vanities, not blazing too sharp witli sensibility, 
not throwing out coquettish jets of flame, not waver- 
ing, and meaningless with pretended warmth, but 
open, glowing and sti'ong. Its dark shades and angles 
it may have ; for what is a soul worth that does not 
lake a slaty tinge from those griefs that chill the 
blood? Yet still the fire is gleaming; you see it in 
the crevices ; and anon it will give radiance to the 
whole mass, 

It hurts the eyes, this fire ; and I draw up a 

screen painted over with rough, but graceful figures. 

The true heart wears always the veil of modesty — 
(not of prudery which is a dingy, iron, repulsive 



Anthracite. "^3 

screen.) It will not allow itself to be looked on too 
near — it might scorch ; but through the veil you feel 
the warmth ; and through the pretty figures that 
modesty will robe itself in, you can see all the while 
the golden outlines, and by that token, you hioio that 
it is glowing and burning with a pure and steady 
flame. 

With such a heart the mind fuses naturally — a 
holy and heated fusion ; they work together like 
twins-born. With such a heart, as Raphael says to 
Adam, 

Love hath his seat 
In reason, and is judicious. 

But let me distinguish this heart from your clay- 
cold, luke-warm, half-hearted soul ; — considerate, 
because ignorant ; judicious, because possessed of no 
latent fires that need a curb ; prudish, because with 
no warm blool to tempt. This sort of soul may pass 
scatheless through the fiery furnace of life ; strong, 
only in its weakness ; pure, because of its failings ; 
and good, only by negation. It may triumph over 
love, and sin, and death ; but it will be a triumph of 
the beast, which has neither passions to subdue, or 
energy to attack, or hope to quench. 



84 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

Lot us come back to the steady and earnest heart, 
glowing like my anthracite coal. 

I fancy I see such a one nov/ : — the eye is deep 
and reaches back to the spirit ; it is not the trading 
eye, weighing your purse ; it is not the worldly e3'e 
weighing position ; it is not the beastly eye, weigh- 
ing your appearance ; it is the heart's eye, weighing 
your soul ! 

It is full of deep, tender, and earnest feeling. It 
is an eye, which looked on once, you long to look ou 
again ; it is an eye which will haunt your dreams, — 
an eye which will give a colour, in spite of you, to all 
your reveries. It is an eye which lies before you in 
your future, like a star in the mariner's heaven ; by 
it, unconsciously, and from force of deep soul-habit, 
you take all your observations. It is meek and quiet ; 
but it is full, as a spring that gushes in flood ; an 
Aphrodite and a Mercury — a Vauclause and a Cli- 
tumnus ! 

The face is an angel face ; no matter for curious 
lines of beauty ; no matter for popular talk of pretti- 
ness ; no matter for its angles, or its proportions ; 
no matter for its colour or its form — the soul is there, 
illuminating every feature, burnishing every point, 
hallowing every surf:ice. It tells of honesty, sincerity 
and worth ; it tells of truth and virtue ; — and you 



Anthracite. 85 

clasp the image to your heart, as the received ideal 
of your fondest dreams. 

The figure may be this or that, it may be tall or 
short, it matters nothing, — the heart is there. The 
talk may be soft or low, serious or piquant — a free 
and honest soul is wai*ming and softening it all. As 
you speak, it speaks back again ; as you think, it 
thinks again — (not in conjunction, but in the same 
sign of the Zodiac ;) as you love it loves in return. 

It is the heart for a sister, and happy is the 

man who can claim such ! The warmth that lies in 
it is not only generous, but religious, genial, devo- 
tional, tender, self-sacrificing, and looking heaven- 
ward. 

A man without some sort of religion, is at best a 
poor reprobate, the foot-ball of destiny, with no tie 
linking him to infinity, and the wondrous eternity 
that is begun witli hira ; but a woman without it, is 
even worse — a flame without heat, a rainbow without 
colour, a flower without perfume ! 

A man may in some sort tie his frail hopes and 
honors, with weak, shifting ground-tackle to business, 
or to the world ; but a woman without that anchor which 
they call Faith, is adrift, and a-wreck ! A man may 
clumsily contrive a kind of moral responsibility, out 
of his relations to mankind ; but a woman in her 
comparatively isolated sphere, where afil'ction and not 



86 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

purpose is the controlling motive, can find no basis 
for any system of right action, but that of spiritual 
faith. A man may craze his thought, and his brain, 
to trustfulness in such poor harborage as Fame and 
lieputation may stretch before him ; but a woman — 
where can she put her hope in storms, if not in 
Heaven ? 

And that sweet trustfulness — that abiding love — 
that enduring hope, mellowing every page and scene 
of life, lighting them with pleasantest radiance, when 
the world-storms break like an army with smoking 
cannon — what can bestow it all, but a holy soul-tie to 
what is above the storms, and to what is stronger 
than an army with cannon ? Who that has enjoyed 
the counsel and the love of a Christian mother, but 
will echo the thought with energy, and hallow it with 
a tear ? et moi, je pleurs ! 

My fire is now a mass of red-hot coal. The whole 
atmosphere of my room is warm. The heart that 
with its glow can light up, and warm a gai-ret with 
loose casements and shattered roof, is capable of the 
best love^ — domestic love. I draw farther off, and the 
images upon the screen change. The warmth, the 
hour, the quiet, create a home feeling ; and that feel- 
ing, quick as lightning, has stolen from the world of 
fancy (a Promethean theft,) a home object, about 



A N T 11 K A C I T E . 87 

•which my musings go on to drape themselves in lux- 
uiious reverie. 

There she sits, by the corner of the fire, in a 

neat home dress, of sober, yet most adorning colour. 
A little bit of lace ruilic is gathered about the neck, 
by a blue ribbon ; and the ends of the ribbon are 
crossed under the dimpling chin, and are fastened 
neatly by a simple, unpretending brooch — your gift. 
The arm, a pretty taper arm, lies over the carved 
elbow of the oaken chair ; the hand, white and deli- 
cate, sustains a little home volume that hangs from 
her fingers. The forefinger is between the leaves, 
and the others lie in relief upon the dark embossed 
cover. She repeats in a silver voice, a line that has 
attracted her fancy ; and you listen — or at any rate, 
you seem to listen — with your eyes now on the lips, 
now on the forehead, and now on the finger, where 
glitters like a star, the marriage ring — little gold 
band, at which she does not chafe, that tells you, — 
she is yours ! 

Weak testimonial, if that were all that told 

it ! The eye, the voice, the look, the heart, tells 
you stronger and better, that she is yours. And a 
feeling within, where it lies you know not, and 
whence it comes you know not, but sweeping over 
heart and brain, like a fire-flood, tells you too, that 



88 Keveres of a Bachelor. 

you are hers ! Irremediably bound tis Massinger's 
Hortensio : 

I am subject to another's will, and cau 
Nor speak, nor do, without permission from her I 

The fire is warm as ever ; what length of heat ia 
this hard burning anthracite ! It has scarce sunk yet 
to the second bar of the grate, though the clock upon 
the church-tower has tolled eleven. 

— Aye, — mused I, gaily — such heart does not 
grow faint, it does not spend itself in idle puffs of 
blaze, it does not become chilly with the passing 
years ; but it gains and grows in strength, and heat, 
until the fire of life, is covered over with the ashes of 
death. Strong or hot as it may be at the first, it 
loses nothing. It may not indeed, as time advances, 
throw out, like the coal-fire, when new-lit, jets of 
blue sparkling flame ; it may not continue to bubble, 
and gush like a fountain at its source, but it will be- 
come a strong river of flowing (.Parities. 

Clitumnus breaks from under the Tuscan moun- 
tains, almost a flood ; ou a glorious spring day T 
leaned down and tasted the water, as it boiled from 
its sources ; — the little temple of white marble, — the 
mountain sides gray with olive orchards, — the white 
streak of road, — the tall poplars of the river margin 



Anthracite. 89 

were glistcuiug in the bright Italian sunlight, around 
uie. Later, I saw it when it had become a river, — 
still clear and strong, flowing serenely between its 
prairie banks, on which the white cattle of the valley 
browsed ; and still farther down, I welcomed it, 
•where it joins the Arno, — flowing slowly under 
wooded shores, skirting the fair Florence, and the 
bounteous fields of the bright Cascino ; — gathering 
strength and volume, till between Pisa and Leghorn, 
— in sight of the wondrous Leaning Tower, and the 
ship-masts of the Tuscan port, it gave its waters to 
its life's grave — the sea. 

The recollection blended sweetly now with my 
musings, over my garret grate, and offered a flowing 
image, to bear along upon its bosom the affections 
that were grouping in my Reverie. 

It is a strange force of the mind and of the fancy, 
that can set the objects which are closest to the heart 
far down the lapse of time. Even now, as the fire 
fades slightly, and sinks slowly towards the bar, which 
i» the dial of my hours, I seem to see that image of 
love which has played about the fire-glow of my grate 
— years hence. It still covers the same warm, trust- 
ful, religious heart. Trials have tried it ; afflictions 
have weighed upon it ; danger has scared it ; and 
death is comins near to subdue it : but still it is the 



90 Reveries f a Bachelor. 

The fingers are thinner ; the face has lines of care, 
and sorrow, crossing each other in a web-work, that 
makes the golden tissue of humanity. But thre heart 
is fond, and steady ; it is the same dear heart, the 
same self-sacrificing heart, warming, like a fire, all 
around it. Afiliction has tempered joy ; and joy 
adorned affliction. Life and all its troubles have be- 
come distilled into an holy incense, rising ever from 
your fireside, — an offering to your household gods. 

Your dreams of reputation, your swift determina- 
tion, your impulsive pride, your deep uttered vows to 
win a name, have all sobered into afi"ection — have all 
blended into that glow of feeling, which finds its cen- 
tre, and hope, and joy in Hc^ie From my soul I 
pity him whose soul does not leap at the mere utter- 
ance of that name. 

A home ! — it is the bright, blessed, adorable phan- 
tom which sits highest on the sunny horizon that 
girdeth Life ! When shall it be reached } When 
shall it cease to be a glittering day-dream, and be- 
come fully and fairly yours ? 

It is not the house, though that may have its 
charms ; nor the fields carefully tilled, and streaked 
with your own foot-paths ; — nor the trees, though 
their shadow be to you like that of a great rock in a 
weary land ; — nor yet is it the fireside, with its sweet 
blaze-play; — nor the pictures which tell of loved 



A N T H R A C I T K . 91 

ones , nor the cherished books, — but more far than all 
these — it is the Presence. The Lares of your wor- 
ship are there ; the altar of your confidence there ; 
the end of your worldly faith is there ; and adorning 
it all, and sending your blood in passionate flow, is 
the ecstasy of the conviction, thas there at least you 
are beloved ; that there you are understood ; that 
there your errors will meet ever with gentlest forgive- 
ness ; that there your troubles will be smiled away ; 
that there you may unburden your soul, fearless of 
harsh, unsympathizing ears ; and that there you may 
be entirely and joyfully — yourself! 

There may be those of coarse mould — and I have 
seen such even in the disguise of women — who will 
reckon these feelings puling sentiment. God pity 
them ! — as they have need of pity. 

That image by the fireside, calm, loving, joyful, 

is there still : it goes not, however my spirit tosses, 
because my wish, and every will, keep it there, 
unerring. 

The fire shows through the screen, yellow and 
warm, as a harvest sun. It is in its best age, and 
that age is ripeness. 

A ripe heart ! — now I know what Wordsworth 
meant, when he said, 



92 K E V E R I E S F A B A C li E L O R . 

The good die first, 
And they whose hearts are dry as summer dust. 
Burn to the socket ! 

The town clock is striking midnight. The cold of 
the night-wind is urging its way in at the door and win- 
dow-crevice ; the fire has sunk almost to the third 
bar of the grate. Still my dream tires not, but 
wraps fondly round that imag^, — now in the far olF, 
chilling mists of age, growing sainted. Love has 
blended into reverence ; passion has subsided into 
joyous content. 

And what if age comes, said I, in a new flush 

of excitation, — what else proves the wine ? What 
else gives inner strength, and knowledge, and a 
steady pilot-hand, to steer your boat out boldly upon 
that shoreless sea, where the river of life is running ? 
Let the white ashes gather ; let the silver hair lie, 
where lay the auburn ; let the eye gleam farther 
back, and dimmer ; it is but retreating toward the 
pure sky-depths, an usher to the land where you wil 
follow after. 

It is quite cold, and I take away the screen alto- 
gether ; there is a little glow yet, but presently the 
coal slips down below the third bar, with a rumbling 
sound, — like that of coarse gravel falling into a new- 
dug grave. 



Anthracite. 93 



-She is eone ! 



Well, the hoart has burned fah-ly, evenly, gener- 
ously, while there was mortality to kindle it ; eternity 
will surely kindle it better. 

-Tears indeed ; but they are tears of thanks- 
giving, of resignation, and of hope ! 

And the eyes, full of those tears, which ministering 
angels bestow, climb with quick vision, upon the 
angelic ladder, and open upon the futurity where she 
has entered, and upon the country, which she enjoys. 

It is midnight, and the sounds of life are dead. 

You are in the death chamber of life ; but you arc 
also in the death chamber of care. The world seems 
sliding backward ; and hope and you are sliding for- 
ward. The clouds, the agonies, the vain expectan- 
cies, the braggart noise, the fears, now vanish be- 
hind the curtain of the Past, and of the Night. 
They roll from your soul like a load. 

In the dimness of what seems the ending Present, 
you reach out your prayerful hands toward that 
boundless Future, where God's eye lifts over the 
horizon, like sunrise on the ocean. Do you recog- 
nize it as an earnest of something better .' Aye, if 
the heart has been pure, and steady, — burning liko 
luy lire — it has learned it without seeming to learn. 
Faith has grown upon it, as the blossom grows upon 
the bud, or the flower upon the slow-lifting stalk. 



94 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

Cares cannot come into the dream-land where I 
live. They sink with the dying street noise, and 
vanish with the embers of my fire. Even Ambition, 
with its hot and shifting flame, is all gone out. 
The heart in the dimness of the fading fire-glow is 
all itself. The memory of what good things have 
come over it in the troubled youth-life, bear it up ; 
and hope and faith bear it on. There is no extrava- 
gant pulse-flow ; there is no mad fever of the brain ; 
but only the soul, forgetting — for once — all, save its 
destinies, and its capacities for good. And it mounts 
higher and higher on these wings of thought ; and 
hope burns stronger and stronger out of the ashes of 
decaying life, until the sharp edge of the grave 
seems but a foot-scraper at the wicket of Elysium ! 

13ut what is paper ; and what are words ? Vain 
things ! The soul leaves them behind ; the pen 
staggers like a starveling cripple ; and your heart is 
leaving it, a whole length of the life-course behind. 
The soul's mortal longings, — its poor baflled hopes, 
are dim now in the light of those infinite longings, 
which spread over it, soft and holy as day-dawn. 
Eternity has stretched a corner of its mantle toward 
you, and the breath of its waving fringe is like a galo 
of Ai'aby. 

A little rumbling, and a last plunge of the cinders 
within my grate, startled me, and dragged back my 



A N T H R A C . .^ E . Of) 

fcincy from my flower chase, beyond the Phlcgethon, 
to the white ashes, that were uow thick all over the 
darkened coals. 

— A' ^ this — mused I — is only a bachelor-dream 
about a pure, and loving heart ! And to-morrow 

comes cankerous life again : is it wished for ? 

Or if not wished for, is the not wishing, wicked ? 

Will dreams satisfy, reach high as they can ? Are 
we not after all poor grovelling mortals, tied to earth, 
and to each other ; are there not sympathies, and 
hopes, and affections which can only find their issue, 
and blessing, in fellow absorption ? Does not the 
heart, steady, and pure as it may be, and mounting 
on soul flights often as it dare, want a human sympa- 
thy, perfectly indulged, to make it healthful ? Is 
there not a fount of love for this world, as there is a 
fount of love for the other ? Is there not a certain 
store of tenderness, cooped in this heart, which must, 
and toill be lavished, before the end comes ? Does 
it not plead with the judgment, and make issue 
with prudence, year after year ? Docs it not dog 
your steps all through your social pilgrimage, set- 
ting up its claims in forms fresh, and odorous as new- 
blown heath bells, saying, — come away from the 
heartless, the factitious, the vain, and measure your 
heart not by its constraints, but by its fulness, and 
by its depth ? — let it run, and be joyous ! 



96 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

Is there no demon that comes to your harsh night- 
dreams, like a taunting fiend, whispering — be satisfied ; 
keep your heart from running over ; bridle those 
afi"ections ; there is nothing worth loving ? 

Does not some sweet being hover over your spirit of 
reverie like a beckoning angel, crowned with halo, 
saying — hope on, hope ever ; the heart and I are 
kindred ; our mission wUl be fulfilled ; nature shall ac- 
complish its purpose ; the soul shall have its Paradise ! 

1 threw myself upon my bed : and as ray 

thoughts ran over the definite, sharp business of the 
morrow, my Reverie, and its glowing images, that 
made my heart bound, swept away, like tliose fleecy 
rain clouds of August, on which the sun paints rain- 
bows — driven Southward, by a cool, rising wind from 
the North. 

1 wonder, — thought I, as 1 dropped asleep, — 

if a married man with his sentiment made actual, is, 
after all, as happy as we poor fellows, in our dreams ? 



\.i 



®l)iri Hctjme* 



21 (Eigar tl)rec tinus CigljUb, 



OVER HIS CIGAR. 



I DO not believe that there was ever an Aunt 
Tabithy who could abide cigars. My Aunt 
Tabithy hated them with a peculiar hatred. She was 
not only insensible to the rich flavor of a fresh rolling 
volume of smoke, but she could not so much as 
tolerate the sight of the rich russet colour of an 
Havana-labelled box. It put her out of all conceit 
with Guava jelly, to find it advertised in the samo 
tongue, and with the same Cuban coarseness of 
design. 

She could see no good in a cigar. 

" But by yom- leave, my aunt," said I to her, the 
other morning, — " there is very much that is good in 
a ciaar." 



100 Reveriks of a Bachelor. 

My aunt who was sweeping, tossed her head, and 
with it, her curls — done up in paper. 

" It is a very excellent matter," continued I, 
puffing. 

" It is dirty," said my aunt. 

"It is clean and sweet," said I; "and a most 
pleasant soother of disturbed feelings ; and a capital 

companion ; and a comforter " and I stopped tc 

puff. 

" You know it is a filthy abomination," said my 

aunt, — " and you ought to be ," and she stopped 

to put up one of her curls, which with the energy of 
her gesticulation, had fallen out of its place. 

" It suggests quiet thoughts" — continued I, — " and 
makes a man meditative ; and gives a current to his 
habits of contemplation, — as I can show you," said I, 
warming with the theme. 

My aunt, still fingering her papers, — with the pin 
in her mouth, — gave a most incredulous shrug. 

" Aunt Tabithy" — said I, and gave two or three 
violent, consecutive puffs, — " Aunt Tabithy, I can 
make up such a series of reflections out of my cigar, 
as would do your keart good to listen to !" 

" About what, pray .?" said my aunt, contemptu- 
ously. 

. " About love," said I, " whicn is easy enough 
lighted, but wantf constancy to keep it in a glow; — 



Over his Cigar. 101 

or about matrimony, which has a great deal of fire 
in the beginning, but it is a fire that consumes all 
that feeds the blaze ; — or about life," continued I 
earnestly, — " which at the first is fresh and odorous, 
but ends shortly in a withered cinder, that is fit only 
for the ground." 

M3' aunt who was forty and unmarried, finished her 
curl with a flip of the fingers, — resumed her hold of 
the broom, and leaned her chin upon one end of it, 
with an expression of some wonder, some curiosity, 
and a great deal of expectation. 

I could have wished my aunt had been a little less 
curious, or that I had been a little less communica- 
tive : for though it was all honestly said on my part, 
yet my contemplations bore that vague, shadowy, and 
delicious sweetness, that it seemed impossible to put 
them into words, — least of all, at the bidding of an 
old lady, leaning on a broom-handle. 

" Give me time, Aunt Tabithy," — said I, — " a good 
dinner, and after it a good cigar, and I will serve you 
such a sun-shiny sheet of reverie, all twisted out of 
the smoke, as will make your kind old heart ache !" 

Aunt Tabithy, in utter contempt, either of my 
mention of the dinner, or of the smoke, or of the old 
heart, commenced sweeping furiously. 

" If I do not" — continued I, anxious to appease 
her, — " if I do not, Aunt Tabithy, it ^shall be my last 



102 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

cigar; (Aunt Tabithy stopped sweeping) and all my 
tobacco money, (Aunt Tabithy drew near me) shall 
go to buy ribbons for my most respectable, and worthy 
Aunt Tabithy; and a kinder person could not have 
them ; or one," continued I, with a generous puff, 
" whom they would more adorn." 

My Aunt Tabithy gave me a half-playful, — ^half- 
thankful nudge. 

It was in this way that our bargain was struck ; 
my part of it is already stated. On her part, Aunt 
Tabithy was to allow me, in case of my success, an 
evening cigar unmolested, upon the front porch, 
underneath her favorite rose-tree. It was concluded, 
I say, as I sat ; the smoke of my cigar rising grace- 
fully around my Aunt Tabitlij's curls ; — our right 
bands joined ; — my left was holding my cigar, while 
in hers, was tightly grasped — her broom-stick. 

And this Reverie, to make the matter short, is 
what came of the contract. 



I. 

Lighted with a Coal. 

TAKE up a coal with the tongs, and setting the 
end of my cigar against it, pufF — and puff again ; 
but there is no smoke. There is very little hope of 
lighting from a dead coal ; — no more hope, thought 
I, — than of kindling one's heart into flame, by con- 
tact with a dead heart. 

To kindle, there must be warmth and life ; and 1 
sat for a moment, thinking, — even before I lit my 
cigar, — on the vanity and folly of those poor, pur- 
blind fellows, who go on puffing for half a lifetime, 
against dead coals. It is to be hoped that Heaven, 
in its mercy, has made their senses so obtuse, that 
they know not when their souls are in a flame, or 
when they are dead. I can imagine none but the 



104 Reveries of a Bache:. or. 

most moderate satisfaction, iu continuing to iove, 
what has got no ember of love within it. The Ital- 
ians have a very sensible sort of proverb, — amare, e 
non essere amato, e tempo perdulo : — to love, and not 
be loved, is time lost. 

I take a kind of rude pleasure in flinging down a 
coal that has no life in it. And it seemed to me, — 
and may Heaven pardon the ill-nature that belongs 
to the thought, — that there would be much of the 
same kind of satisfaction, in dashing from you a luke- 
warm creature, covered over with the yellow ashes 
of old combustion, that with ever so much attention, 
and the nearest approach of the lips, never shows 
signs of fire. May Heaven forgive me again, but I 
should long to break away, though the marriage bonds 
held me, and see what liveliness was to be found else- 
where. 

I have seen before now a creeping vine try to grow 
up against a marble wall ; it shoots out its tendrils ia 
all directions, seeking for some crevice by which to 
fasten and to climb ; — looking now above and now 
below, — twining upon itself, — reaching farther up, 
but after all, finding no good foothold, and falling 
away as if in despair. But nature is not unkind; 
twining things were made to twine. The longing 
tendrils take new strength iu the sunshine, and in the 
showers, and shoot out toward some hospitable trunk 



L J G H T E D WITH A C A I . 105 

They fasten easily to the kindly I'oughness of the bark, 
and stretch lip, dragging after them the vine ; which 
by and by, from the topmost bough, will nod its blos- 
soms over at the marble wall, that refused it succour, 
as if it said, — stand there in your pride, cold, white 
wall ! we, the tree and I are kindred, it the helper^ 
and I the helped ; and bound fast together, we rio< 
in the sunshine, and in gladness. 

The thought of this image made me search for 9 
new coal that should have some brightness in it 
There may be a white ash over it indeed ; as yo? 
will find tender feelings covered with the mask o( 
courtesy, or with the veil of fear ; but with a breath 
it all flies off, and exposes the heat, and the glow that 
you are seeking. 

At the first touch, the delicate edges of the cigar 
crimple, a thin line of smoke rises, — doubtfully for a 
whQe, and with a coy delay ; but after a hearty respi- 
ration or two, it grows strong, and my cigar is fairly 
lighted. 

That first taste of the new smoke, and of the fra- 
grant leaf is very grateful ; it has a bloom about it, 
that you wish might last. It is like your first love, — 
fresh, genial, and rapturous. Like that, it fills up 
all the craving of your soul ; and the light, blue 
wreaths of smoke, like the roseate clouds that hang 
around the morning of your heart life, cut you off 



106 Reveries OF a Bachelor. 

from the chill atmosphere of mere worldly compan- 
ionship, and make a gorgeous fia-mament for your 
fancy to riot in. 

I do not speak now of those later, and manlier pas- 
sions, into which judgment must be thrusting its cold 
tones, and when all the sweet tumult of your heart has 
mellowed into the sober ripeness of affection. But I 
mean that boyish burning, which belongs to every 
poor mortal's lifetime, and which bewilders him with 
the thought that he has reached the highest point of 
human joy, before he has tasted any of that bitter- 
ness, from which alone our highest human joys have 
spring. I mean the time, when you cut initials with 
your jack-knife on the smooth baik of beech trees ; 
and went moping under the long shadows at sunset ; 
and thought Louise the prettiest name in the wide 
world ; and picked flowers to leave at her door ; and 
stole out at night to watch the light in her window; 
and read such novels as those about Helen Mar, or 
Chailotte, to give some adequate expression to your 
agonized feelings. 

At such a stage, you are quite certain that you are 
deeply, and madly in love ; you persist in the face of 
heaven, and earth. You would like to meet the in- 
dividual who dared to doubt it. 

Yoy think she has got the tidiest, and jauntiest 



Lighted with a Coal. 107 

little figure that ever was seen. You think back 
upon some time when in your games of forfeit, you 
gained a kiss from those lips ; and it seems as if the 
kiss was hanging on you yet, and warming you all 
over. And then again, it seems so strange that your 
lips did really touch hers ! You half question if it 
could have been actually so, — and how you could have 
dared ; — and you wonder if you would have courage 
to do the same thing again .' — and upon second 
thought, are quite sure you would, — and snap your 
fingers at the thought of it. 

What sweet little hats she does wear ; and in the 
school room, when the hat is hung up — what curls — 
golden curls, worth a hundred Golcondas ! How 
bravely you study the top lines of the spelling book 
— that your eyes may run over the edge of the cover 
without the schoolmaster's notice, and feast upon 
her ! 

You half wish that somebody would run away with 
her, as they did with Amanda, in the Children of the 
Abbey ; — and then you might ride up on a splendia 
black horse, and draw a pistol, or blunderbuss, and 
shoot the villians, and carry her back, all in tears, 
fainting, and languishing upon your shoulder / — ana 
have her father (who is Judge of the County Court,) 
take your hand in both of his, and make some elo- 
quent remarks. A great many such re-captures you 



108 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

run over in your mind, and think how delightful it 
would be to peril your life, either by flood, or fire, — to 
cut off your arm, or your head, or any such trifle, — 
for your dear Louise. 

You can hardly think of anything more joyous ia 
life, than to live with her in some old castle, very far 
away from steamboats, and post-offices, and pick wild 
geraniums for her hair, and read poetry with her, 
under the shade of very dark ivy vines. And you 
would have such a charming boudoir in some corner 
of the old ruin, with a harp in it, and books bound in 
gilt, with cupids on the cover, and such a fairy couch, 
with the curtains hung — as you have seen them hung 
in some illustrated Arabian stories — upon a pair of 
carved doves ! 

And when they laugh at you about it, you turn it 
off perhaps with saying — " it isn't so ;" but after- 
ward, in your chamber, or under the tree where you 
have cut her name, you take Heaven to witness, that 
it is so ; and think — what a cold world it is, to be so 
careless about such holy emotions ! You perfectly 
hate a certain stout boy in a green jacket, who is for- 
ever twitting you, and calling her names ; but when 
some old maiden aunt teases you in her kind, gentle 
way, you bear it very proudly ; and with a feeling as 
if you could bear a great deal more for her sake 
And when the minister reads off marriage anonunce- 



Lighted with a Coal. 109 

ments ia the cliuich, you tbiuk how it will sound one 
of these days, to have your name, and hers, read from 
the pulpit ; — and how the people will all look at you, 
and how prettily she will blush ; and how poor little 
Dick, who you know loves her, but is afraid to say so, 
will squirm upon his bench. 

— Heigho ! — mused I, — as the blue smoke rolled 
up around my head, — these first kindlings of the love 
that is in one, are very pleasant ! — but will they last ? 

You love to listen to the rustle of her dress, as she 
stirs about the room. It is better music than grown- 
up ladies will make upon all their harpsichords, ia 
the years that are to come. But this, thank Heaven, 
you do not know. 

You think you can trace her foot-mark, on your 
way to the school ; — and what a dear little foot-mark 
it is ! And fi-om that single point, if she be out of 
your sight for days, you conjure up the whole image, 
— the elastic, lithe little figure, — the springy step, — 
the dotted muslin so light, and flowing, — the silk 
kerchief, with its most tempting fringe playing upon 
the clear white of her throat, — how you envy that 
fringe ! And her chin is as round as a peach — and 
the lips — such lips ! — and you sigh, and hang your 
head ; and wonder when you shall see her again ! 

You would like to write her a htter ; but then peo- 
ple would talk so coldly about it and beside you are 



110 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

not quite sure you could write such billets as Thad- 
deus of Warsaw used to write ; and anything less 
warm or elegant, would not do at all. You talk about 
this one, or that one, v.hom they call pretty, in the 
coolest way in the world ; you see very little of their 
prettiness ; they are good girls to be sure ; and you 
hope they will get good husbands some day or other ; 
but it is not a matter that concerns you very much. 
They do not live in your world of romance ; they are 
not the angels of that sky which your heart makes 
rosy, and to which I have likened the blue waves of 
this rolling smoke. 

You can even joke as you talk of others ; you can 
smile, — as you think — very graciously ; you can say 
laughingly that you are dooply in love with them, and 
think it a most capital j oko ; you can touch their 
hands, or steal a kiss from them io your games, most 
imperturbably ; — they are very dead coals. 

Uut the live one is very lively. When you take 
the name on your lip, it seems somehow, to be made 
of different materials from the rest ; you cannot half 
so easily separate it into lotters ; — write it, indeed 
you can ; for you have had practice, — very much pri- 
vate practice on odd scraps of paper, and on the fly- 
leaves of geographies, and of A^our natural philosophy. 
You know perfectly well how it looks ; it seems to 
pe written indeed, somewhere behind your eyes ; and 



LlGHTET WITH A CoAL. Ill 

in such liappy position with respect to the optic 
nerve, that you sec it all the time, though you are 
looking in an opposite direction ; and so distinctly, 
that you have great fears lest people looking into your 
eyes, should see it too ! 

For all this, it is a far more delicate name to han- 
dle than most that you know of. Though it is very 
cool, and pleasant on the brain, it is very hot, and 
difficult to manage on the lip. It is not, as your 
schoolmaster would say, — a name, so much as it is an 
idea ; — not a noun, but a verb, — an active, and tran- 
sitive verb ; and yet a most irregular verb, wanting 
the passive voice. 

It is something against your schoolmaster's doc- 
trine, to find warmth in the moonlight; but with that 
soft hand — it is very soft — lying within your arm, 
there is a great deal of warmth, whatever the philo- 
sophers may say, even in pale moonlight. The beams 
too, breed sympathies, very close-running sympathies, 
— not talked about in the chapters on optics, and alto- 
gether too fine for language. And under their in- 
fluence, you retain the little hand, that you had not 
dared retain so long before ; and her struggle to re- 
cover it, — if indeed it be a struggle, — is infinitely less 
than it was ; — nay, it is a kind of struggle, not so 
much against you, as between gladness and modesty. 
It makes you as bold as a lion ; and the feeble hand 



112 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

like a poor lamb in the lion's clutch, is powerless, 
and very meek ; — and failing of escape, it will sue for 
gentle treatment ; and will meet your warm promise, 
with a kind of grateful pressure, that is but half 
acknowledged, by the hand that makes it. 

My cigar is burning with wondrous freeness ; and 
from the smoke flash forth images bright and quick 
as lightning — with no thunder, but the thunder of 
the pulse. But will it all last ? Damp will deaden 
the iire of a cigar ; and there are hellish damps — 
alas, too many, — that will deaden the early blazing 
cf the heart. 

She is pretty, — growing prettier to your eye, the 
more you look upon her, and prettier to your ear, the 
more you listen to her. But you wonder who the 
tall boy was, who you saw walking with her, two days 
ago .'' He was not a bad-looking boy ; on the con- 
trary, you think, — (with a grit of your teeth) — that 
he was infernally handsome ! You look at him very 
shyly, and very closely, when you pass him ; and turn 
to sec how he walks, and to measure his shoulders, 
and are quite disgusted with the very modest, and 
gentlemanly way, with which he carries himself. 
You think you would like to have a fisticuff with him, 
if you were only sure of having the best of it. You 
sound the neighborhood coyly, to find out who the 



Liu II TED viTH A Coal. 113 

strange boy is ; and are half ashamed of yourself for 
doing it. 

You gather a magnificent bouquet to send her, and 
tie it with a green ribbon, and a love knot, — and get 
a little rose-bud in acknowledgment. That day, you 
pass the tall-boy with a very patronizing look ; and 
wonder if he would not like to have a sail iu your 
boat } 

But by and by, you find the tall boy walking with 
her again ; and she looks sideways at him, and with a 
kind of grown up air, that makes you feel very boy- 
like, and humble, and furious. And you look dag- 
gers at him when you pass ; and touch your cap to 
her, with quite uncommon dignity ; — and wonder if 
she is not sorry, and does not feel very badly, to have 
got such a look from you 't 

On some other day, however, you meet her alone ; 
and the sight of her makes your face wear a genial, 
sunny air ; and you talk a little sadly about your 
fears and your jealousies ; she seems a little sad, and 
a little glad, together ; — and is sorry she has made 
you feel badly, — and you are sorry too. And with 
this pleasant twin sorrow, you are knit together again 
— closer than ever. That one little tear of hers has 
been worth more to you than a thousand smiles. 
Now you love her madly ; you could swear it — swear 
it to her; or swea'- it to the universe. You even say 



114 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

as much to some kiad old friend at night-fall ; but 
your mention of her, is tremulous and joyful, — with 
a kind of bound in your speech, as if the heart worked 
too quick for the tongue ; and as if the lips were 
ashamed to be passing over such secrets of the soul, 
to the mere sense of hearing. At this stage, you 
cannot trust yourself to speak her praises ; or if you 
venture, the expletives fly away with your thought, 
before you can chain it into language ; and your 
speech, at your best endeavor, is but a succession of 
broken superlatives, that you are ashamed of. You 
strain for language that will scald the thought of her ; 
but hot as you can make it, it falls back upon your 
heated fancy, like a cold shower. 

Fleat so intense as this consumes very fast ; and 
the matter it feeds fastest on, is — ^judgment ; and 
with judgment gone, there is room for jealousy to 
creep in. You grow petulant at another sight of that 
tall-boy ; and the one tear, which cured your first 
petulance, will not cure it now. You let a little of 
your fever break out in speech — a speech which you 
go home to mourn over. But she knows nothing of 
the mourning, while she knows very much of the 
anger. Vain tears are very apt to breed pride ; and 
when you go again with your petulance, you will find 
your rosy-lipped girl taking her first studies in dig- 
nity 



Lighted with a Coal. 115 

You ■will stay away, you say ; — poor fool, you 
are feeding on what your disease loves best ! You 
wonder if she is not sighing for your return, — and if 
your name is not running in her thought, — and if 
tears of regret are not moistening those sweet eyes. 

And wondering thus, you stroll moodily, and 

hopefully toward her father's home ; you pass the 
door once — twice ; you loiter under the shade of an 
old tree, where you have sometimes bid her adieu ; 
your old fondness is struggling with your pride, and 
has almost made tlie mastery ; but in the very mo- 
ment of victory, you see yonder your hated rival, and 
beside him looking very gleeful, and happy — your per- 
fidious Louise. 

How quick you throw off the marks of your strug- 
gle, and put on the boldest air of boyhood ; and what 
a dexterous handling to your knife, and a wonderful 
keenness to the edge, as you cut away from the bark 
of the beech tree, all trace of her name ! Still there 
is a little silent relenting, and a few tears at night, 
and a little tremor of the hand, as you tear out — the 
next day, — -every fly leaf that bears her name. But 
at sight of your rival, — looking so jaunty, and in such 
capital spirits, you put on the proud man again. 
You may meet her, but you say nothing of your 
struggles ; — oh no, not one word of that ! — but you 
talk with amazing rapidity about your games, or what 



116 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

not ; and you never — never give her another peep 
into your boyish heart ! 

For a week, you do not see her, — nor for a month, 
— nor two months — nor three. 

— PufF — puff once more ; there is only a little 
nauseous smoke ; and now — my cigar is gone out 
altogether. I must light again. 



11. 

With a Wisp of Paper. 

rIERE are those who throw away a cigar, when 
once gone out; they must needs have plenty 
more. But nobody that I ever heard of, keeps a cedar 
box of hearts, labelled at Ilavanna. Alas, there is 
but one to light ! 

But can a heart once lit, be lighted again ? Au- 
thority on this point is worth something ; yet it should 
be impartial authority. I should be loth to take in 
evidence, for the fact, — however it might tally with 
my hope, the affidavit of some rakish old widower, 
who had cast his weeds, before the grass had started 
on the mound of his affliction ; and I should be as 
slow to take, in way of rebutting testimony, the oath 
of any sweet young girl, just becoming conscious of 
her heart's existence — by its lost 



118 Pi EYERIES OF A BACHELOR. 

Very much, it seems to me, depends upon the 
quality of the fire : and I can easily conceive of one 
so pure, so constant, so exhausting, that if it were 
once gone out, whether in the chills of death, or under 
the blasts of pitiless fortune, there would be no re- 
kindling ; — simply because there would be nothing 
left to kindle. And I can imagine too a fire so 
earnest, and so true, that whatever malice might urge, 
or a devilish ingenuity devise, there could no other 
be found, high or low, far or near, which should not 
so contrast with the first, as to make it seem cold as 
ice. 

I remember in an old play of Davenport's, the 
hero is led to doubt his mistress ; he is worked upon 
by slanders, to quit her altogether, — though he has 
loved, and does still love passionately. She bids him 
adieu, with large tears dropping from her eyes, (and I 
lay down my cigar, to recite it aloud, fancying all the 
while, with a varlet impudence, that some Abstemia 
is repeating it to me) — 

Farewell Lorenzo, 



Whom my soul doth love ; if you ever marry, 
May you meet a good vcife ; so good, that you 
May not suspect her, nor may she be worthy 
Of your suspicion: And if you hear hereafter 
That I am dead, inquire but my last words, 
And you shall know that to the last I loved j'^ou. 



With i Wisp of Paper. 119 

And when you walk forth with your second choice, 
Into the pleasant fields, and by chance talk of me, 
Imagine that you see me thin, and pale, 
Strewing your path with flowers ! 

Poor Abstemia ! Lorenzo never could find 



puch another, — there never could be such another, for 
such Lorenzo. 

To blaze anew, it is essential that the old fire be 
utterly gone ; and can any truly-lighted soul ever 
grow cold, except the grave cover it ? The poets all 
say no : Othello, had he lived a thousand years 
would not have loved again ; — nor Desdemona, — nor 
Andromache, — nor ?.Iedea, — nor Ulysses, — nor Ham- 
let. But in the cool wreaths of the pleasant smoke, 
let us see what truth is in tlie poets. 

— What is love, — mused I, — at the first, but a 
mere fancy .'' There is a prettiness, that your soul 
cleaves to, as your eye to a pleasant flower, or your 
ear to a soft melody. Presently, admiration comes 
in, as a sort of balance-wheel for the eccentric revo- 
lutions of your fancy ; and your admiration is touched 
off with such neat quality as respect. Too much of 
this indeed, they say, deadens the fancy ; and so re- 
tards the action of the heart machinery. But with a 
proper modicum to serve as a stock, devotion is 
grafted in ; and then, by an agreeable and confused 



120 Revf. RiEs OF A Bachelor. 

mingling, all these qualities, and affections of the 
soul, become transfused into that vital feeling, called 
Love. 

Your heart seems to have gone over to another 
and better counterpart of your humanity ; what is 
left of you, seems the mere husk of some kernel that 
has been stolen. It is not an emotion of yours, 
which is making very easy voyages towards another 
soul, — that may be shortened, or lengthened, at will ; 
but it is a passion, that is only yours, because it is 
there ; the more it lodges there, the more keenly you 
feel it to be yours. 

The qualities that feed this passion, may indeed 
belong to you ; but they never gave birth to such an 
one before, simj^ly because there was no place in 
which it could grow. Nature is very provident in 
these matters. The chrysalis does not burst, until 
there is a wing to help the gauze-fly upward. The 
shell does not break, until the bird can breathe ; nor 
does the swallow quit its nest, until its wings are tip- 
ped with the airy oars. 

This passion of love is strong, just in proportion as 
the atmosphere it finds, is tender of its life. Let that 
atmosphere change into too great coldness, and the 
passion becomes a wreck, — not yours, because it is 
not worth your having ; — nor vital, because it has lost 
the soil where it grew . But is it not laying the re- 



With a W i s r o r P a r e r . 121 

proach in a high quarter, to say that those qualities 
of the heart which begot this passion, are exhausted, 
and will not thenceforth germinate through all of your 
life time r 

Take away the worm-eaten frame from your 

arbour plant, and the wrenched arms of the despoiled 
climber will not at the first, touch any new treUis ; 
they cannot in a day, change the habit of a year. 
But let the new support straid firmly, and the needy 
tendrils will presently lay hold upon the stranger ; 
and your plant will regain its pride and pomp ; — 
cherishing perhaps in its bent figure, a memento of 
the Old ; but in its more earnest, and abounding life, 
mindful only of its sweet dependance on the jNew. 

Let the Poets say what they will, these ufFections 
of ours are not blind, stupid creatures, to starve under 
polar snows, when the very breezes of Heaven are 
the appointed messengers to guide them toward 
warmth and sunshine ! 

And with a little suddenness of manner, 1 

tear ofi:" a wisp of paper, and holding it in the blaze 
of my lamp, relight my cigar. It does not burn so 
easily perhaps as at first : — it wants warming, before 
it will catch ; but presently, it is in a broad, full 
glow, that throws light into the corners of my room. 

Just so, — thought I, — the love of youth, 

which succeeds the crackling blaze of boyhood, 
R 



122 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

makes a broader flame, though it may not be so easily 
kindled. A mere dainty step, or a curling lock, or a 
soft blue eye are not enough ; but in her, who has 
quickened the new blaze, there is a blending of all 
these, with a certain sweetness of soul, that finds 
expression in whatever feature or motion you look 
upon. Her charms steal over you gently, and almost 
imperceptibly. You think that she is a pleasant 
companion — nothing more : and you find the opinion 
strongly confirmed day by day ; — so well confirmed, 
indeed, that you begin to wonder — why it is, that she 
is such a delightful companion } It cannot be her 
eye, for you have seen eyes almost as pretty as 
Nelly's ; nor can it be her mouth, though Nelly's 
mouth is certainly very sweet. And you keep 
studying what on earth it can be that makes you so 
earnest to be near her, or to listen to her voice. 
The study is pleasant. You do not know any study 
that is more so ; or which you accomplish with less 
mental fatigue. 

Upon a sudden, some fine day, when the air is 
balmy, and the recollection of Nelly's voice and 
manner, more balmy still, you wonder — if you are 
in love ? When a man has such a wonder, he is 
either very near love, or he is very far away from it ; 
it is a wonder, that is either suggested by his hope, 



With a W i 6 p of Paper. 123 

or by that entanglement of feeling which blunts all 
his perceptions. 

But if not in love, you have at least a strong 
fancy, — so strong, that you tell your friends care- 
lessly, that she is a nice girl, — nay, a beautiful girl ; 
and if your education has been bad, you strengthen 
the epithet on your own tongue, with a very wicked 
expletive : — of which the mildest form would be — 
'deuced fine girl!' Presently, however, you get 
beyond this ; and your companionship, and your 
wonder, relapse into a constant, quiet habit of un- 
mistakeable love : — not impulsive, quick, and fiery, 
like the first ; but mature and calm. It is as if it 
were born with your soul, and the recognition of it 
was ratber an old remembrance, than a fresh passion 
It does not seek to gratify its exuberance, and force, 
with such relief as night-serenades, or any Jacques- 
like meditations in the forest ; but it is a quiet, still 
joy, that floats on your hope, into the years to come,— 
making the prospect all sunny and joyful. 

It is a kind of oil and balm for whatever was 
stormy, or harmful ; it gives a permanence to the 
smile of existence. It does not make the sea of your 
life turbulent with high emotions, as if a strong wind 
were blowing ; — but it is as if an Aphrodite had 
broken on the surface, and the ripples were spreading 



124 Reveriks if a Bachelor. 

with a swfset, low soun3, and widening far out to the 
very shores of time. 

There is no need now, as with the boy, to bolster 
up your feelings with extravagant vows : even should 
you try this in jier presence, the words are lacking to 
put such vows in. So soon as you reach them, they 
fail you : and the oath only quivers on the lip, or tells 
its story by a pressure of the fingers. You wear a 
brusque, pleasant air with your acquaintances, and 
hint — with a sly look — at possible changes in your 
circumstances. Of an evening, you are kind to the 
most unattractive of the wall-flowers, — if only your 
Nelly is away ; and you have a sudden charity for 
street beggars, with pale children. You catch your- 
self taking a step in one of the new Polkas, upon a 
country walk : and wonder immensely at the number 
of bright days which succeed each other, without 
leaving a single stormy gap, for your old melancholy 
moods. Even the chambermaids at your hotel, never 
did their duty one half so well ; and as for your man 
Tom, he is become a perfect pattern of a fellow. 

My cigar is in a fine glow ; but it has gone out 
once, and it may go put again. 

-You begin to talk of marriage ; but some 

obstinate Papa, or guardian uncle tliink that it will 
never do ; — that it is quite too soon, or that Nelly ia 
a mere giil. Or some of your wild oats, — quite 



W I T H A ^\' ] s i' OF Paper. 125 

forgotten by yourself, — slioot up en tbe vision of a 
staid Mamma, and throw a very damp shadow on 
your character. Or ihe old lady has an ambition of 
another sorr, wlilch you, a simple, earnest, plodding, 
bachelor, can never g'ratiiy ; — being of only passable 
appearance, and unschooled in the fashions of the 
world, you Vv'ill be eternally rubbing the elbows of the 
old lady's pride. 

All this will be strangely afflictive to one who has 
been living for quite a number of weeks, or months, 
in a pleasant dream-land, where there were no live 
per cents, or reputations, but onlj'^ a very full, and 
delirious flow of feeling. What care you for any 
position, except a position near the being that you 
love } What wealth do you prize, except a wealth of 
heart, that shall never know diminution ; — or for 
reputation, except that of truth, and of honor f How 
hard it would break upon these pleasant idealities, to 
have a weazen-faced old guardian, set his arm in 
yours, and tell you how tenderly he has at heart the 
happiness of his niece ; — and reason with you about 
your very small, and sparse dividends, and your 
limited business ; — and caution you, — for he has a 
lively regard for your interests, — about continuing 
your addresses ! 

The kind old curmudgeon ! 

Your mat! Tom ha.s g: or.-a suddenly a very stupid 



126 Revehif. s OF A Bachelor. 

fellow ; and all your cliarity for vvithereJ wall-flowers, 
is gone. Perhaps in your wrath the suspicion comes 
over you, that she too wishes you were somethinf 
higher, or more famous,o:- richer, or anything but what 
you are ! — a very dangerous suspicion : for no man 
with any true nobility of soul, can ever make hia 
heart the slave of another's condescension. 

Eut no,- — 3"ou will not, you cannot believe this of 
Nelly; — that face of hers is too mild and gracious; 
and her manner, as she takes your hand, after your 
heart is made .sad, and turns away those rich blue 
e\'es,— shadowed more deeply than ever by the long 
and moistened fringe ; — and the exquisite softness, and 
meaning of the pressure of those little fingers ; — and 
the low, half sob ; and the heaving of that bosom, in 
its struggles between love, and duty, — -all forbid. 
Nelly, you could swear, is tenderly indulgent, like the 
fond creature that she is, toward all your short-com- 
ings; and would not barter your strong love, and 
your honest heart, for the greatest magnate in the 
land. 

VVliat a spur to effort is the confiding love of a true- 
hearted woman ! That last fond ^ook of hers, hope- 
ful, and encouraging, has more powei' witliin it to 
nerve your soul to high deeds, than all the admoni- 
tions of all your tutors. Your heart, beating large 
with hope, quickens the flow upon the brain ; and 



With a AV i s p of Paper. 127 

you make wild vows to wia greatness. But alas, this 
is a great workl — very full, and very rough ; 

all up-hill work when we would do; 



All down-hill, when we suffer * 

Hard, withering toil only can achieve a name ; and 
long days, and months, and years, must be passed in 
the chase of that bubble — reputation ; which when 
once grasped, breaks in your eager clutch, into a 
hundred lesser bubbles, tliat soar above you still ! 

A clandestine meeting from time to time, and a 
note or two tenderly written, keep up the blaze in 
your heart. But presently, the lynx-eyed old guar- 
dian — so tender of your interests, and hers, — forbids 
even this irregular and unsatisfying correspondence. 
Now you can feed your,',elf only on stray glimpses of 
her figure — as full of sprightlinoss and grace, as ever ; 
and that beaming face, you are half sorry to see from 
time to time, — still beautiful. You struggle with your 
moods of melancholy, and wear bright looks yourself — 
bright to her, and very bright to the eye of the old 
curmudgeon, who has snatched your heart away. It 
will never do to show your weakness to a man. 

At length, on some pleasant morning, you learn 
that she is gone, — too far away to be seen, too 

'^ Festus. 



128 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

closely guarded to be reached. For a while you 
throw down your boolis, and abandon your toil in 
despair, — thinking very bitter thoughts, and making 
very helpless resolves. 

My cigar is still burning ; but it will require con- 
stant and strong respiration, to keep it in a glow. 

A letter or two dispatched at random, relieve the 
excess of your fever ; until with practice, these lan- 
dom letters have even less heat in them, than the 
heat of your study, or of your business. Grief — 
thank God ! — is not so progressive, or so cumulative 
as joy. For a time, there is a pleasure in the mood 
with which you recal your broken hopes ; and with 
which you selfishly link hera to the shattered wreck ; 
but absence, and ignorance tame the point of your 
woe. You call up the image of Nelly, adorning other 
and distant scenes. You see the tearful smile give 
place to a blithesome cheer ; and the thought of you 
that shaded her fair face so long, fades under the sun- 
shine of gaiety ; or at best, it only seems to cross 
that white forehead, like a playful shadow, that a 
fleecy cloud-remnant will fling upon a sunny lawn. 

As for you, the world with its whirl and roar, is 
deafening the sweet, distant notes, that come up 
through old, choked channels of the affections. Life 
is calling for earnestness, and not for regrets. So 
the months, and the ycais slip by ; your bachelor 



With a \v i s p of Paper. 129 

habit grows easy and iight with wearing ; you have 
mourned enough, to smiie at the violent mourning of 
others ; and you have enjoyed enough, to sigh over 
their little eddies of delight. Dark shades, and deli- 
cious streaks of crimson and gold colour lie upon your 
life. Your heart with all its weight of ashes, can yet 
spai-kle at the sound of a fairy step ; and your face 
can yet open into a round of joyous smiles, — that are 
almost hopes, — in the pre.sence of some bright-eyed 
girl. . 

15ut amid this, there will float over you from time 
to time, a midnight trance, in which you will hear 
again with a thirstj- car, the witching melody of the 
days that are gone ; and you will wake from it with a 
shudder into the cold resolves of your lonely, and 
manly life. But the shudder passes as easy as night 
from morning. Tearful regrets, and memories that 
touch to the quick, are dull weapons to break through 
the panoply of your seared, eager, and ambitious 
manhood. They only venture out like timid, white- 
winged flies, when night is come , and at the first 
glimpse of the dawn, they shrivel up, and lie without a 
flutter, in some corner of your soul. 

And when, years aft3r, you learn that she has re- 
turned — a woman, there is a slight glow, but no 
tumultuous bound of the heart. Life, and time 
have worried you down like a spent hound. The 
6* 



130 Reveries df a Bachelor. 

world has given you a habit of easy and unmeaning 
snrlles. You half accuse yourself of ingratitude and 
forgetfulness ; but the accusation does not oppress 
you. It does not even distract your attention from 
the morning journal. You cannot work yourself into 
a respectable degree of indignation against the old 
gentleman — her guardian. 

You sigh — poor thing ! — and in a very flu.shy 
waistcoat, you venture a morning call. 

She meets you kindly, — a comely, matronly dame 
in gingham, with her curls all gathered under a high- 
topped comb ; and she presents to you two little boys 
ia smart crimson jackets, dressed up with braid. And 
you dine with Madame — a fiimily party ; and the 
weazen-faced old gentleman meets you with a most 
pleasant shake of the hand, — hints that you were 
among his niece's earliest friends, and hopes that you 
are getting on well .•' 

Capitally well ! 

And the boys toddle in at dessert — Dick to get a 
plum from your own dish ; Tom to be kissed by his 
rosy-faced papa. In short, you are made perfectly 
at home ; and you sit over your wine for an hour, ia 
a cozy smoke with the gentlemanly uncle, and with 
the very courteous husband of your second flame. 

It is all very jovial at the table ; for good wine, is 
I find, a great strcngthenor of the bachelor heart. 



WiTiJ A Wisp of Paper. 131 

But afterward, when night has fairly set in, and the 
blaze of your fire goes flickering over your lonely 
quarters, you heave a deep sigh. And as your 
thought runs back to the perfidious Louise, and calls 
up the married, and matronly Nelly, you sob over 
that poor dumb heart within you, which craves so 
madly a free and joyous utterance ! And as you lean 
over with your forehead in your hands, and your eyes 
fall upon the old hound slumbering on the rug, — the 
tears start, and you wish, — that you had married 
years ago ; — and that you too had your pair of prat 
tling boys, to drive away the loneliness of your soli- 
tary hearth stone. 

My cigar would not go ; it was fairly out. 

But with true bachelor obstinacy, I vowed that I 
would light again. 



III. 

Lighted with a }\Tatch. 

HATE a raatcb. I feel sure that brimstone 
matches were never made in heaven ; and it is 
sad to think, that with few exceptions, matches are all 
of them tipped with brimstone. 

But my taper having burned out, and the coals 
being all dead upon the hearth, a match is all that is 
left to me. 

All matches will not blaze on the first trial ; and 
there are those, that with the most indefatigable 
coaxings, never show a spark. They may indeed 
leave in their trail phosphorescent streaks ; but you 
can no more light your cigar at them, than you can 
kindle your heart, at the covered wife-trails, which 
the infernal, gos.>ipping, old match-makers will lay 
in your path. 



Lighted with a ]\1 a t c h . 133 

Was there ever a bachelor of seven and twenty, I 
wonder, who has not been haunted by pleasant old 
ladies, and trim, excellent, good-natured, married 
friends, who talk to him about nice matches — ' ve«-y 
nice matches,' — matches, which never go off? And 
who, pray, has not had some kind old uncle, to fill 
two sheets for him, (perhaps in the time of heavy 
postages) about some most eligible connection, — :' of 
highly respectable parentage !' 

What a delightful thing, surely, for a withered 
bachelor, to bloom forth in the dignity of an ances- 
tral tree ! What a precious surprise for him, who 
has all his life worshipped the wing-heeled Mercury, 
to find on a sudden, a great stock of preserved, and 
most respectable Penates ! 

In God's name, — thought I, pufiing vehement- 
ly, — what Ls a man's heart given him for, if not to 
choose, where his heart's blood, every drop of it is 
flowing ? Who is going to dam these billowy tides of 
the soul, whose roll is ordered by a planet greater 
than the moon ; — and that planet — Venus ? Who is 
going to shift this vane of my desires, when every 
breeze that passes in my heaven is keeping it all the 
more strongly, to its fixed bearings ? 

Beside this, there are the money matches, urged 
upon 3^ou by disinterested bachelor friends, who 
would be very proud to see you at the head of an 



134 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

establishment. And I must confess that this kind of 
talk has a pleasant jingle about it ; and is one of the 
cleverest aids to a bachelor's day- dreams, that can 
well be imagined. And let not the pouting lady 
condemn me, without a hearing. 

It is certainly cheerful to think, — for a contempla- 
tive bachelor, — that the pretty ermine which so sets 
off the transparent hue of your imaginary wife, or the 
lace which lies so bewitchingly upon the superb 
roundness of her form, — or the graceful boddice, 
trimmed to a line, which is of such exquisite adapta- 
tion to her lithe figure, will be always at her com- 
mand ; — nay, that these are only units among the 
chameleon hues, under which you shall feed upon her 
beauty ! I want to know if it is not a pretty cabinet 
picture, for fancy to luxuriate upon — that of a sweet 
wife, who is cheating hosts of friends into love, sym- 
pathy and admiration, by the modest munificence of 
her wealth ? Is it not rather agreeable, to feed your 
hopeful soul upon that abundance, which, while it 
supplies her need, will give a range to her loving 
charities ; — which will keep from her brow the 
shadows of anxiety, and ^vill sublime her gentle na- 
ture, by adding to it the grace of an angel of mercy ? 

Is it not rich, in those days when the pestilent hu- 
mours of bachelorhood hang heavy on you, to foresee in 
that shadowy realm, where hope is a native, the quiet 



Lighted with a Match. 135 

of a home, made splendid with attractions ; and made 
real, by the presence of her, who bestows them ? — 
Upon my word — thought I, as I continued puflSng, — 
such a match must make a very grateful lighting of 
one's inner sympathies ; nor am I prepared to say, 
that such associations would not add force to the most 
abstract love imaginable. 

Think of it for a moment ; — what is it, that we 
poor fellows love ? We love, if one may judge for 
himself, over his cigar, — gentleness, beauty, refine- 
ment, generosity, and intelligence, — and far above 
these, a returning love, made up of all these qualities, 
and gaining upon your love, day by day, and month 
by month, like a sunny morning, gaining upon the 
frosts of night. 

But wealth is a great means of refinement ; and it 
is a security for gentleness, since it removes disturb- 
ing anxieties ; and it is a pretty promoter of intelli- 
gence, since it multiplies the avenues for its recep- 
tion ; and it is a good basis for a generous habit of 
life ; it even equips beauty, neither hardening its 
hand with toil, nor tempting the wrinkles to come 
early. But whether it provokes greatly that return- 
ing passion, — that abnegation of soul, — that sweet 
trustfulness, and abiding affection, which are to clothe 
your heart with joy, is far more doubtful. Wealth 
while it gives so much, asks much in return ; and 



136 R E V E "l 1 E S OF A iJ A C II E : R . 

the soul that is grateful to mammon, is not over 
ready to be grateful for intensity of love. It is hard 
to gratify those, who have nothing left to gratify. 

Heaven help the man who having wearied his soul 
with delays and doubts, or exhausted the freshness, 
and exuberance of his youth, — by a hundred little 
dallyings of love, — consigns himself at length to the 
issues of what people call a nice match — whether of 
money, or of family ! 

Heaven help you — (I brushed the ashes from my 
cigar) when you begin to regard marriage as only a 
respectable institution, and under the advices of staid 
old friends, begin to look about you for some very 
respectable wife. You may admire her figure, and 
her family ; and boar pleasantly in mind the very 
casual mention whicli has been made by some of 
your penetrating friends, — that she has large expec- 
tations. You think that she would make a very 
capital appearance at the head of your table , nor in 
the event of your couiing to any public honor, would 
she make you blush for her breeding. She talks 
well, exceedingly well ; ^nd her face has its charms ; 
especially under a little excitement. Her dress is 
elegant, and tasteful, and she is constantly remarked 
upon by all your friends, as a ' nice person.' Some 
good old lady, in whose pew she occasionally sits on a 
Sunday, or to whom slie has sometime sent a papier 



Lighted "v i t h a IM a t c h . 137 

macbe card-case, for the sLow-box of some Dorcas 
benevolent society, tbinks, — witb a sly wink, — tbat 
sbe would make a fine wife fur — somebody. 

Sbe certainly has an elegant fi_i;ure ; and tbe mar- 
riage of some half dozen of your old flames, warn you 
tbat time is slipping and your cbances failing. And 
in the pleasant warmth of some after-dinner mood, 
you resolve — witb her image in her prettiest pelisse 
drifting across your brain — tbat you will marry. 
Now comes tbe pleasant excitement of the chase ; 
and whatever family dignity may surround her, only 
adds to the pleasurable glow of tbe pursuit. You 
give an hour more to your toilette, and a hundred or 
two more, a year, to your tailor. All is orderl}', 
dignified, and gracious. Charlotte is a sensible wo- 
man, every body says ; and you believe it yourself. 
You agree in your talk about books, and churches, 
and flowers. Of course she has good taste — for sbe 
accepts you. The acceptance is dignified, elegant, 
and even courteous. 

You receive numerous congratulations ; and your 
old friend Tom writes you — that he bears you are 
going to marry a splendid woman ; and all tbe old 
ladies say — what a capital match ! And your busi- 
ness partner, who is a married man, and something 
of a wag — ' sympathizes sincerely.' Upon the whole, 
you feel a little prouO of your arrangement. You 



138 Reveries of a Bag ielor. 

write to an old friend in the country, that you are to 
marry presently Miss Charlotte of such a street, 
whose father was something very fine, in his way ; 
and whose father before him was very distinguished ; 
— you add, in a postscript, that she is easily situated, 
and has ' expectations.' Your friend, who has a wife 
that he loves, and that loves him, writes back kindly 
— ' hoping you may be happy ;' and hoping so your- 
self, you light your cigar, — one of your last bachelor 
cigars, — with the margin of his letter. 

The match goes off with a brilliant marriage ; — at 
which you receive a very elegant welcome from your 
wife's spinster cousins, — and drink a great deal of 
champagne with her bachelor uncles. And as you 
take the dainty hand of ynv.y bride, — very magnifi- 
cent under that bridal wreath, and with her face lit 
up by a brilliant glow, — your eye, and your soul, for 
the first time, grow full. And as your arm circles 
that elegant figure, and you draw her toward you, 
feeling that she is yours, — there is a bound at your 
heart, that makes you think your soul-life is now 
whole, and earnest. All your early dreams, and im- 
aginations, come flowing on your thought, like be- 
wildering music ; and as you gaze upon her, — the ad- 
miration of that crowd, — it seems to you, that all that 
your heart prizes, is made good by the accident of 
marriage. 



Lighted with a jM a t c h . 139 

— Ah — thought I, brushing off the ashes again, — 
bridal pictures are not home pictures ; and the hour 
at the altar, is but a poor type of the waste of years ! 

Your household is elegantly ordered ; Charlotte 
has secured the best of housekeepers, and she meets 
the compliments of your old friends who come to dine 
with you, with a suavity, that is never at fault. And 
they tell you, — after the cloth is removed, and you 
sit quietly smoking in memory of the old times, — 
that she is a splendid woman. Even the old ladies 
who come for occasional charities, think Madame a 
pattern of a lady ; and so think her old admirers, 
whom she receives still with an easy grace, that half 
puzzles you. And as you stand by the ball room 
door, at two of the morning, with your Charlotte's 
shawl upon your arm, some little panting fellow will 
confirm the general opinion, by telling you that 
Madame is a magnificent dancer ; and Monsieur le 
Comte, will praise extravagantly her French. You 
are grateful for all this ; but you have an uncom- 
monly cerious way of expressing your gratitude. 

You think you ought to be a very happy fellow ; 
and yet long shadows do steal over your thought; 
and you wonder that the sight of your Charlotte in 
the dress you used to admire so much, does not scat- 
ter them to the winds ; but it does not. You feel 
coy about putting your arm around that delicately 



140 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

robed figure, — you niiglit derange the plaitings of her 
dress. She is civil towards you ; and tender towards 
your bachelor friends. She talks with dignity, — ad- 
iusts her lace cape, — and hopes you will make a 
fio-ure in the world, for the sake of the family. Her 
gheek is never soiled with a tear ; and her smiles arc 
frequent, especially when you have some spruce 
young fellows at your table. 

You catch sight of occasional notes perhaps, whose 
superscription you do not know ; and some of her ad- 
mirers' attentions become so pointed, and constant, 
that your pride is stirred. It would be silly to show 
jealousy ; but you suggest to your ' dear' — as you 
sip your tea, — the slight impropriety of her action. 

Perhaps you fondly long for some little scene, as a 
proof of wounded confidence ; — but no — nothing of 
that; she trusts, (calling you ' my dear,') that she 
knows how to sustain the dignity of her position. 

You are too sick at heart, for comment, or for 
reply. 

And is this the intertwining of soul, of which 

you had dreamed in the days that are gone } Is this 
the blending of sympathies that was to steal from life 
its bitterness ; and spread over care and suffering, the 
sweet, ministering hand of kindness, and of love ? 
Aye, you may well wander back to your bachelor 
club, and make the hours long at the journals, or at 



Lighted \v i t u >. Tsl a t c ii . 41 

play — killing the flagging lapse of youv life ! Talk 
spriglitly -with youi' old friends, — and mimic the joy 
you have not ; or you will wear a bad name upon 
your hearth, and head. Never suffer your Charlotte 
to catch sight of the tears which in bitter hours, may 
start from your eye ; or to hear the sighs which in 
your times of solitary musings, may break forth sud- 
den, and heavy. Gro on counterfeiting your life, as 
you have begun. It was a nice match ; and you are 
a nice husband ! 

But you have a little boy, thank God, toward 
whom your heart runs out freely ; and you love to 
catch him in his respite from your well-ordered nur- 
sery, and the tasks of his teachers— alone ; — and to 
spend upon him a little of that depth of feeling, 
which through so many years has scarce been stirred. 
You play with him at his games ; you fondle him ; 
you take him to your bosom. 

— But papa — he says- -see how you have tumbled 
my collar. What shall I tell mamma f 

Tell her, my boy, that I love you ! 

Ah, thought I — [mj cigar was getting dull, and 
nauseous,) — is there not a spot in your heart, that 
the gloved hand of your elegant wife has never 
reached : — that you wish it might reach .' 

You go to see a far-away friend : his was not a 
' nice match :' he was married years before you : and 



142 Reveries of a ii a ;. ,-: e l o r . 

yet the beaming looks of his wife, and his lively 
smile, are as fresh and honest as they were years 
ago ; and they make you ashamed of your disconso 
late humour. Your stay is lengthened, but the 
home letters are not urgent for your return : yet 
they are marvellously proper letters, and rounded 
with a French adieu. You could have wished a little 
scrawl from your boy at the bottom, in the place of 
the postscript which gives you the names of a new 
opera troupe ; and you hint as much — a very bold 
stroke for you. 

Ben, — she says, — writes too shamefully. 

And at your return, there is no great anticipation 
of delight ; in contrast with the old dreams, that a 
pleasant summer's journey has called up, your parlour 
as you enter it — so elegant, so still — so modish — • 
seems the charnel-house of your heart. 

By and by, you fall into weary days of sickness ; 
you have capital nurses — nurses highly recommend- 
ed — nurses who never make mistakes — nurses who 
have served long in the family. But alas for that 
heart of sympathy, and for that sweet face, shaded 
with your pain — like a soft landscape with flying 
clouds — you have none of them ! Your pattern wife 
may come in from time to time to look after your 
nurse, or to ask after your sleep, and glide out — her 
silk dress rustling upon the door — like dead leaves 



Lighted with . Match. 1 43 

in the cool night breezes of winter. Or perhaps 
after putting this chair in its place, and adjusting to a 
more tasteful fold that curtain — she will ask you, with 
a tone that might mean sympathy, if it were not a 
stranger to you, — if she can do anything more. 

Thank her — as kindly as you can, and close your 
eyes, and dream : — or rouse up, to lay your hand 
•upon the head of your little boy, — to drink in health, 
and happiness, from his earnest look, as he ga?'^a 
strangely upon your pale and shrunken forehead. 
Your smile even, ghastly with long suffering, disturbs 
him ; there is no interpreter, save the heart, between 
you. 

Your parched lips feel strangely, to his flushed, 
healthful face ; and he steps about on tip-toe, at a 
motion from the nurse, to look at all those rosy- 
colored medicines upon the table, — and he takes 
your cane from the corner, and passes his hand over 
the smooth ivory head ; and he runs his eye along the 
wall from picture to jDicture, till it rests on one he 
knows, — a figure in bridal dress, — beautiful, almost 
fond ; — and he forgets himself, and says aloud — 
' there's mamma !' 

The nurse puts her finger to her lip ; you waken 
from your doze to see where your eager boy is look- 
ing ; and your eyes too, take in much as they can of 



144 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

that figure — now shadowy to your fainting vision — • 
doubly shadowy to your fainting heart ! 

From day to day, you sink from life : the physician 
says the end is not far off ; why should it be ? 
There is very little elastic force within you to keep 
the end away. Madame is called, and your little 
boy. Your sight is dim, but they whisper that she 
is beside your bed ; and you reach out your hand — 
both hands. You fancy you hear a sob : — a strange 
sound ! It seems as if it came from distant years — 
a confused, broken sigh, sweeping over the long 
stretch of your life : and a sigh from your heart — 
not audible — answers it. 

Your trembling fingers clutch the hand of your 
little boy, and you drag him toward you, and move 
your lips, as if you would speak to him ; and they 
place his head near you, so that you feel his fins hair 

brushing your cheek. My boy, you must love — 

your mother ! 

Your other hand feels a quick, comnilsive grasp, 
and something like a tear drops upon your face. 
Good God ! — Can it be indeed a tear ? 

You strain your vision, and a feeble smile flits 
over your features, as you seem to see her figure — 
the figure of the painting — bsnding over you; and 
you feel a bound at your heart— the same bound that 
you felt on your bridal monvlng ; — the same bound 



Lighted wit ii a Match. 145 

which you used to feel in the spriiig-tiino of your 
life. 

Only one — rich, full bound of the heart ; 

that is all ! 

— My cigar was out. I could not have lit it 

again, if I would. It was wholly burned. 



" Aunt Tabithy" — said I, as I finished reading, — 
" may I smoke now under your rose tree .'"' 

Aunt Tabithy who had laid down her knitting to 
hear me, — smiled, — brushed a tear from her old 
eyes, — said, — " Yes — Isaac," and having scratched 
the back of her head, with the disengaged needle, 
resumed her knittins. 



Jbuill) IlcDcrie. 



iHorninig, 3Moon, aut> (?» ruins. 



MORNING, NOON, AND EVENING. 



IT is a Spring day under the oaks — the loved oaks 
of a once cherished home, — now alas, mine no 
longer ! 

I had sold the old farm-house, and the groves, 
and the cool springs, where 1 had bathed my head in 
the heats of summer ; and with the first warm days 
of May, they were to pass from mc forever. Seventy 
years they had been in the possession of my mother's 
family ; for seventy years, they had borna the same 
name of proprietorship ; for seventy years, the Lares 
of our country home, often neglected, almost forgot- 
ten, — yet brightened from time to time, by gleams 
of heart-worship, had held their place in the sweet 
valley of Elmgrovo. 



150 Reveries of a Bac h'e lor. 

And in this changeful, bustling, American life of 
ours, seventy years is no child's holiday. The hurry 
of action, and progress, may pass over it with quick 
step ; but the foot-prints are many and deep. You 
surely will not wonder that it made me sad and 
thoughtful, to break the chain of years, that bound 
to my heart, the oaks, the hills, the springs, the 
valley and such a valley ! 

A wild stream runs through it, — large enough 
to make a river for English landscape, — winding be- 
tween rich banks, where in summer time, the swal- 
lows build their nests, and brood by myriads. 

Tall elms rise here and there along the margin, 
and with their uplifted arms, an I leafy spray, throw 
great patches of shade upon the meadow. Old lion- 
like oaks too, where the meadow-soil hardens ioto 
rolling upland, fasten to the ground with their ridgy 
roots; and with their gray, scraggy limbs, make de- 
licious shelter for the panting workers, or for the 
herds of August. 

Westward of the stream, where I am lying, the 
banks roll up swiftly into sloping hills, covered with 
groves of oaks, and green pasture lands, dotted with 
mossy rocks. And farther on, where some wood has 
been swept r'awn, some ten years gone, by the axe, 
the new grov th, heavy with the luxuriant foliage of 
spring, covers wide spots of the slanting land ; — while 



Morning, N" o o n and Evening. 151 

some dead tree iu the midst, still stretches out its 
bare arms to the blast — a solitary mourner, over the 
wreck of its forest brothers. 

Eastward, the ridgy bank passes into wavy mea- 
dows, upon whose farther edge, you see the roofs of 
an old mansion, with tall chimneys and taller elm- 
trees shading it. Beyond, the hills rise gently, and 
sweep away into wood-crowned heights, that are blue 
with distance. At the upper end of the valley, the 
stream is lost to the eye, in a wide swamp wo jd, 
which in the autumn time is covered with a scp ;let 
sheet, blotched here and there by the daik crimson 
stains of the a.sh-tops. Farther on, the hills crowd 
close to the brook, and come down with granite 
boulders, and scattered birch trees, and beeches, — 
under which, upon the smoky mornings of May, ] 
have time and again loitered, and thrown my line into 
the pools, which curl, dark, and still, under their 
tangled roots. 

Below, and looKing southward, through the open- 
ings of the oaks that shade me, I see a broad stretch 
of meadow, with glimpses of the silver surface of the 
stream, and of the giant solitary elms, and of some 
old maple that has yielded to the spring tides, and 
now dips its 1-ower boughs in the insidious current ; — 
and of clumps of aiders, and willow tufts, — above 
which even now, the black-and-white coated Bob-o'- 



152 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

Lincoln, is wheeling Lis musical fliglit, while his 
T[uieter mate sits swaying on the topmost twigs. 

A quiet road passes within a short distance of me, 
and crosses the brook by a rude timber bridge ; be- 
side the bridge, is a broad glassy pool, shaded by old 
maples, and hickories, where the cattle drink each 
morning, on their way to the hill pastures. A step 
or two beyond the stream, a lane branches across the 
meadows, to the mansion with the tall chimneys. I 
can just remember now, the stout, broad-shouldered 
old gentleman, with his white hat, his long white 
hair, and his white headed cane, who built the house, 
and who farmed the whole valley around me. He ia 
gone, long since ; and lies in a grave-yard looking 
upon the sea-! The elms that he planted shake their 
weird arms over the mouldering roofs ; and his fruit- 
garden shows only a battered phalanx of mossy limbs, 
which will scarce tempt the July marauders. 

In the other direction, upon this side the brook, 
the road is lost to view, among the trees ; but if I 
were to follow the windings upon the hill-side, it 
would bring me shortly upon the old hon)c of my 
grandfather ; there is no pleasure in wandering there 
now. The woods that sheltered it from the northern 
winds, are cut down ; the tall cherries that made the 
yard one leafy bower, are dead. The cornice ia 
straggling from the eaves ; the porch has fallen ; the 



M R N I N G , N O O N A N D E V K K INC. 153 

stone chimney is yawning with vide gaps. Within, 
it is even worse ; the floovo sway upon the moulder- 
ing beams ; the doors all sag from their hinges ; the 
rude frescos upon the parlor-wall are peeling off ; all 

is going to decay. And my grandfather sleeps in 

a little grave-yard, by the garden-wall. 

A lane branches from the country road, within a 
few yards of me, and leads back, along the edge of 
the meadow, to the homely cottage, which has been 
my special care. Its gray porch, and chimney "^re 
thrown into rich relief, by a grove of oaks that skirt.s 
the hill behind it ; and the doves are flying uneasily 
about the open doors of the granary, and barns. The 
morning sun shines pleasantly on the gray group of 
buildings ; and the lowing of the cows, not yet driven 
afield, adds to tha charming homeliness of the scene. 
But alas, for the poor azalias, and laurels, and vines, 
that I had put out upon the little knoll before the 
cottage door — they are all of them trodden down ; 
only one poor creeper hangs its loose tresses to the 
lattice, all dishevelled, and forlorn ! 

This bye-lane which opens upon my farm-house, 
leaves the road in the middle of a grove of oaks ; the 
brown gate swings upon an oak tree, — the brown 
gate closes i;pon an oak tree. There is a rustic seat, 
built between two veteran trees, that rise from a little 
hillock near by. Half a century ago, there was a 



154 IlEV£r.iES OF A Bachelor. 

rustic seat on the ".ame hillock — between the same 
veteran trees. I can trace marks of the old blotches 
upon the bark, and the scars of the nails, upon the 
scathed trunks. Time, and time again, it has been 
renewed. This, the last, was built by my own hands, 
— a cheerful, and a holy duty. 

Sixty years ago, they tell me, my grandfather used 
to loiter here with his gun, while his hounds lay 
around under the scattered oaks. Now he sleeps, as 
I "^aid, in the little grave-yard yonder, where 1 can 
see one or two white tablets glimmering through the 
foliage. I never knew him ; he died, as the brown 
stone table says, aged twenty-six. Yesterday I 
climbed the wall that skirts the yard, and plucked a 
flower from his tomb. I take out now fiom my 
pocket book, that flower — a frail, first-blooming vio- 
let, — and write upon the slip of paper, into which I 
have thrust its delicate stem, — ' From my grand- 
father's tomb :— 1850.' 

But other feet have trod upon this knoll — far 
more dear to me. The old neighbors have some- 
times told me, how they have seen, forty years ago, 
two rosy-faced girls, idling on this spot, under the 
shade, and gathering acorns, and making oak-leaved 
'urlands, for their foreheads. Alas, alas, the gar- 
lands they wear now, are not earthly garlands ! 

Upon that spot, and upon that rustic seat, I am 



Morning, Noon vnd Evening. 155 

lying this ]\Iay morning. I have placed ray gun 
against a tree ; my shot-pouch I have hung upon a 
broken limb. I have thrown my feet upon the bench, 
v.nd lean against one of the gnarled oaks, between 
v\'bich the seat is built. My hat is off; my book and 
paper, are beside me ; and my pencil trembles in my 
fingers, as I catch sight of those white marble tablets, 
gleaming through the trees, from the height above 

me, like beckoning angel faces. If they were 

alive ! — two more near, and dear friends, in a world 
where we count friends, by units ! 

It is morning, — a bright spring morning under the 
oaks — these loved oaks of a once cherished home. 
Last night, I slept in yonder mansion, under the 
elms. The cattle going to the pasture are drinking 
in the pool by the bridge ; the boy who drives them, 
is making his shrill halloo echo against the hills. 
The sun has risen fairly over the eastern heights, 
and shines brightly upon the meadow land, and 
brightly upon a bend of the brook below me. The 
birds, — the blue-birds sweetest and noisiest of all, — 
are singing over me in the branches. A wood-pecker 
is hammering at a dry limb aloft ; and Carlo pricks 
up his ears, and listens, and looks at me, — then 
stretches out his head upon his paws, in a warm bit 
of the sunshine, — and sleeps. 

Morning brings back to me the Past ; and the past 



15 3 R E V E R : 2 S OF A BACHELOR 

brings up not only its actualities, not only its events, 
and memories, but — stranger still, — what might have 
been. Every little circumstance which dawns on the 
awakened memory, is traced not only to its actual, 
but to its possible issues. 

What a wide world that makes of the Past ! — a 
great and gorgeous, — a rich and holy world ! Your 
fancy fills it up artist-like ; the darkness is mellowed 
off into soft shades ; the bright spots are veiled in 
the sweet atmosphere of distance ; and fancy and 
memory together, make up a rich dream-land of the 
past. 

And now, as I go on to trace upon paper some of 
the visions that float across that dream-land of the 
Morning, — I will not — I cannot say, hew much comes 
fancy-wise, and how much from this vaulting memory. 
Of this, the kind reader shall himself be judge. 



I. 

The Morning. 

ISABEL and I, — she is my cousin, and is seven 
years old, and I am ten, — are sitting together on 
the bank of the stream, under an oak tree that leans 
half way over to the water. I am much stronger 
than she, and taller by a head. I hold in my hands 
a little alder rod, with which I am fishing for the 
roach and minnows, that play in the pool below us. 

She is watching the cork tossing on the water, or 
playing with the captured fish that lie upon the bank. 
She has auburn ringlets that fall down upon her 
shoulders ; and her straw hat lies back upon them, 
held only by the strip of ribbon, that passes under 
her chin. But the mn docs not shine upon her head ; 
ibr the oak tree above us is full of leaves ; and only 



158 Keveriesof a Baghelok. 

here and there, a dimple of the sunlight plays upon 
the pool, where I am fishing. 

Her eye is hazel, and bright ; and now and then 
she turns it on me with a look of girlish curiosity, as 
I lift up my rod, — and again in playful menace, as 
she grasps in her little fingers one of the dead fish, 
and threatens to throw it back upon the stream. 
Her little feet hang over the edge of the bank ; and 
from time to time, she reaches down to dip her toe in 
the water ; and laughs a girlish laugh of defiance, as 
I scold her for frightening away the fishes. 

" Bella," I say, " what if you should tumble in the 
river ?" 

"But I won't." 

" Yes, but if you should .'" 

" "Why then you would pull me out." 

" But if I wouldn't pull you out .'" 

"But I know you would ; wouldn't you, Paul?" 

""What makes you think so, Bella }" 

"Because you love Bella." 

" How do 5'^ou know I love Bella .'" 

" Because once you told me so ; and because you 
pick flowers for me that I cannot reach ; and be- 
cause you let me take your rod, when you have a 
fish upon it." 

"But that's no reason, Bella." 

" Then what is, Paul ?" 



T H E !M o R N I N o . ; 59 

" I'm sure I don't know, Bella." 

A little fish has been nibbling for a long time at 
the bait ; the cork has been bobbing up and down ; — 
and now he is fairly hooked, and pulls away toward 
the bank, and you cannot see the cork. 

— " Here, Bella, quick !" — and she springs eagerly 
to clasp her little hands around the rod. But the 
fish has dragged it away on the other side of me ; 
and as she reaches farther, and farther, she slips, 
cries — " oh, Paul !" — and falls into the water. 

The stream they told us, when we came, was over 
a man's head ; — it is surely over little Isabel's. I 
fling down the rod, and thrusting one hand into the 
roots that support the overhanging bank, I grasp at 
her hat, as she comes up ; but the ribbons give way, 
and I see the terribly earnest look upon her face as 
she goes down again. Oh, my mother ! — thought I, 
— if you were only here ! 

But she rises again ; this time, I thrust my hand 
into her dress, and struggling hard, keep her at the 
top, until I can place my foot down upon a project- 
ing root ; and so bracing myself, I drag her to the 
bank, and having climbed up, take hold of her belt 
firmly with both hands, and drag her out ; and poor 
Isabel, choked, chilled, and wet, is lying upon the 
grass. 

I commence crying aloud. The workmen in the 



160 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

fields hear me, and come down. One takes Isabel in 
his arms, and I follow on foot to our uncle's home 
upon the hill. 

— " Oh my children !" — says my mother ; and she 
takes Isabel in her arms ; and presently with dry 
clothes, and blazing wood-fire, little Bella smiles 
again. I am at my mother's knee. 

"I told you so, Paul," says Isabel, — "aunty, 
doesn't Paul love me .?" 

" I hope so, Bella," said my mother. 

" I know so," said I ; and kissed her cheek. 

And how did I know it ? The boy does not ask ; 
the man does. Oh, the fi*eshness, the honesty, the 
vigor of a boy's heart ! — how the memory of it re- 
freshes like the first gush of spring, or the break of 
an April shower ! 

But boyhood has its Pribe, as well as its Loves. 

My uncle is a tall, hard-faced man : I fear him 
wfeen he calls me — " child" ; I love him when he 
calls me — " Paul." He is almost always busy with 
his books ; and when I steal into the library door, as 
1 sometimes do, with a string of fish, or a heaping 
basket of nuts to show to him, — he looks for a mo- 
ment curiously at them, sometimes takes them in his 
fingers, — gives them back to me, and turns over the 
leaves of his book. You are afraid to ask him, if 
you have not worked bravely ; yet you want to do so. 



T hi: J.I o r n I n g . 161 

You sidle out softly, and go to your mother ; she 
scarce looks at 3-our little stores ; but she draws you 
to her with her arm, and prints a kiss upon your 
forehead. Now your tongue is unloosed ; that kiss, 
and that action have done it ; you will tell what 
capital luck you have had ; and you hold up your 
tempting trophies ; — ••' are tb.ey not great, mother ?'' 
But she is looking in your face, and not at your 
prize. 

" Take them, mother," and you lay the basket 
upon her lap. 

""' Thank you, Paul, I do not wish them : but you 
must give some to Bella." 

And away you go to find laughing, playful, cousin 
Isabel. And we sit down together on the grass, and 
I pour out my stores between us. " You shall take, 
Bella, what you wish in your apron, and then when 
study hours are over, we will have such a time down 
by the big rock in the meadow !" 

" But I do not know if papa will let me," says 
Isabel. 

" Bella," I say, " do you love your papa .'" 

" Yes," says Bella, " why not .'" 

" Because he is so cold ; he does not kiss you 
Bella, so often as my mother does ; and besides, 
when he forbids your going away, he does not say, as 
mother does, — my littb girl will be tired, she had 



1 62 Reveries of a B a •■ h e l o r . 

better not go, — but lie says only, — Isabel must not 
go. I wonder what makes him talk so ?" 

" Why Paul, he is a man, and doesn't at any 

rate, I love him, Paul. Besides, my mother is sick, 
yew know." 

" But Isabel, my mother will be your mother too. 
Come Bella, we will go ask her if we may go." 

And there I am, the happiest of boys, pleading 
with the kindest of mothers. And the young heart 
leans into that mother's heai t ; — none of the void now 
that will overtake it like an opening Koran gulf, in 
the years that are to come. It is joyous, full, and 
running over ! 

" You may go," she says, " if your uncle is 
willing." 

" But mamma, I am afraid to ask him ; I do not 
believe he loves me." 

" Don't say so, Paul," and she draws you to her 
side ; as if she would supply by her own love, the 
lacking love of a universe. 

" Go, with your cousin Isabel, and ask him kindly ; 
and if he says no, — make no reply." 

And with courage, we go hand in hand, and steal 
in at the library door. There he sits — I seem to see 
him now, — in the old wainscotted room, covered over 
with books and pictures ; and he wears his heavy- 
rimmed spectacles, and is poring over some big volume, 



The M r in I n g , 163 

full of hard words, that are not in any spelling-book. 
We step up softly ; and Isabel lays her little hand 
upon his arm ; and he turns, and says — " well, my 
.ittle daughter ?" 

I ask if we may go down to the big rock in the 
meadow ? 

He looks at Isabel, and says he is afraid — " we 
cannot go." 

" But why, uncle ? It is only a little way, and we 
will be very careful." 

" I am afraid, my children ; do not say any more : 
you can have the pony, and Tray, and play at 
home." 

" But, uncle " 

" You need say no more, my child." 

I pinch the hand of little Isabel, and look -.u her 
eye, — my own half filling with tears. I feel thai my 
forehead is flushed, and I hide it behind Belly's 
tresses, — whispering to her at the same time — " I ^ 
us go." 

" What sir," says my uncle, mistaking my mean 
ing — " do you persuade her to disobey .'" 

Now I am angry, and say blindly — " no, sir, 1 
didn't !" And then my rising pride will not let me 
say, that I wished only Isabel sliould go out with me. 

Bella cries ; and I shrink out ; and am not easy 
until I have run to bur\' my head in my mother's 



164 Reveries of \ Bachelor. 

bosom. Alas ! pride cannot always find such covert! 
There Tvill be times when it will harrass you strangely ; 
when it will peril friendships, — will sever old, stand- 
ing intimacy ; and then — no resource, but to feed on 
its own bitterness. Hateful pride ! — to be conquered, 
as a man would conquer an encmj^, or it will make 
whirlpools in the curreut of your affections — nay, 
turn the whole tide of the heart into rough, and un- 
accustomed channels ! 

But boyhood has its Grief too, apart from Pride. 

You love the old dog Tray ; and Bella loves him 
as well as you. He is a noble old fellow, with shaggy 
hair, and long ears, and big paws, that he will put 
up into your hand, if you ask him. And he never 
gets angry when you play with him, and tumble him 
over in the long grass, and pull his silken ears. 
Sometimes, to be sure, he will open his mouth, as if 
he would bite, but when he gets your hand fairly in 
his jaws, he will scarce leave the print of his teeth 
upon it. He will swim, too, bravely, and bring 
ashore all the sticks you throw upon the water ; and 
when you fling a stone to tease him, he swims round 
and round, and whines, and looks sorry, that he 
cannot find it. 

He will carry a heaping basket full of nuts too in 
his mouth, and never spill one of them ; and when 
you come out to your uncle's home in the spring, 



T H E M R N I N G . 165 

after staying a wliole winter in the town, he knows 
you — old Tray does ! And he leaps upon you, and 
lays his paws on your shoulder, and licks your face ; 
and is almost as glad to see you, as cousin Bella her- 
self. And when you put Bella on his back for a 
ride, he only pretends to bite her little feet ; — but he 
wouldn't do it for the world. Aye, Tray is a noble 
old dog ! 

But one summer, the farmers say that some of 
their sheep are killed, and that the dogs have worried 
them ; and one of them comes to talk with my uncle 
about it. 

But Tray never worried sheep ; you know he never 
did ; and so does nurse ; and so does Bella ; — for in 
the spring, she had a pet lamb, and Tray never wor- 
ried little Fidele. 

And one or two of the dogs that belong to the 
neighbors are shot ; though nobody knows who shot 
them ; and you have great fears about poor Tray : 
and try to keep him at home, and fondle him more 
than ever. But Tray will sometimes wander off ; till 
finally, one afternoon, he comes back whining pit- 
eously, and with his shoulder all bloody. 

Little Bella cries loud ; and you almost cry, as 
nurse dresses the wound ; and poor old Tray whines 
very sadly. You pat his head, and Bella pats him ; 
and you sit down together by him on the floor of the 



166 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

porch, and bring a rug for bira to lie upon ; and try 
and tempt him with a little milk, and Bella brings a 
piece of cake for him, — but he will eat nothing. 
You sit up till very late, long after Bella has gone to 
bed, patting his head, and wishing you could do 
something for poor Tray; — but he only licks your 
hand, and whines more piteously than ever. 

In the morning, you dress early, and hurry down 
stairs ; but Tray is not lying on the rug ; and you 
run through the house to find him, and whistle, and 
call — Tray ! — Tray ! At length you see him lying 
in his old place, out.by the cherry tree, and you run 
to him ; — but he does not start ; and you lean down 
to pat him, — but he is cold, and the dew is wet upon 
him : poor Tray is dead ! 

You take his head upon your knees, and pat again 
those glossy ears, and cry ; but you cannot bring 
him to life. And Bella conies, and cries with you. 
You can hardly bear to have him put in the ground ; 
but uncle says he must be buried. So one of the 
workmen digs a grave under the cherry tree, where 
he died — a deep grave, and they round it over with 
earth, and smooth the sods upon it — even now I can 
trace Tray's grave. 

You and Bella together, put up a little slab for a 
tombstone ; and she hangs flowers upon it, and ties 
them there with a bit of ribbon. You can scarce 



T H E M R N I N G . '' 67 

play all that day ; and afterward, many weeks later, 
when you are rambling over the fields, or lingering 
by the brook, throwing ofi" sticks into the eddies, you 
think of old Tray's shaggy coat, and of his big paw, 
and of his honest eye ; and the memory of your 
boyish grief comes upon you ; and you say with tears, 

"poor Tray!" And Bella too, in her sad, 

sweet tones, says " poor old Tray, — he is dead!" 



School Days. 

The morning was cloudy and threatened rain ; 
besides, it was autumn weather, and the winds were 
getting harsh, and rustling among the tree-tops that 
shaded the house, most dismally. I did not dare to 
listen. If indeed, I were to stay by the blight fires of 
home, and gather the nuts as they fell, and pile up the 
falling leaves, to make great bonfires, with Ben, and 
the rest of the boys, I should have liked to listen, and 
would have braved the dismal morning with the 
cheerfullest of them all. For it would have been a 
capital time to light a fire in the little oven we had 
built under the wall ; it would have been so pleasant 
to warm our fingers at it, and to roast the great rus- 
sets on the flat stones that made the tcp. 

But this was not in store for me. I had bid the 



168 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

town boys good bye, the day before ; my trunk was 
all packed ; I was to go away — to school. The 
little oven would go to ruin — I knew it would. I 
was to leave my home. I was to bid my mother 
good bye, and Lilly, and Isabel, and all the rest ; — 
and was to go away from them so far, that I should only 
know what they were all doing — in letters. It was 
gad. And then to have the clouds come over on that 
morning, and the winds sigh so dismally ; — oh, it 
was too bad, 1 thought ! 

It comes back to me as 1 lie here this bright spring 
morning, as if it were only yesterday. I remember 
that the pigeons skulked under the eaves of the car- 
riage house, and did not sit, as they used to do in 
summer, upon the ridge ; and the chickens huddled 
together about the stable doors, as if they were 
afraid of the cold autumn. And in the garden, the 
white hollyhocks stood shivering, and bowed to the 
wind, as if their time had come. The yellow musk- 
melons showed plain among the frost bitten vines, 
and looked cold, and uncomfortable. 

Then they were all so kind, in-doors ! The 

cook made such nice things for my breakfast, be- 
cause little master was going ; Lilly would give me 
her seat by the fire, and would put her lump of sugar 
in my cup ; and my mother looked so smiling, and so 
tenderly, that I thought I loved her more than I ever 



The Morning. 169 

did before. Little Ben was so gay too ; and wanted 
me to take his jacknifo, if I wished it, — though he 
knew that I had a bran new one in my trunk. The 
old nurse slipped a little purse into my hand, tied up 
with a green ribbon — with money in it, — and told 
me not to show it to Ben or Lilly. 

And cousin Isabel, who was there on a visit, would 
come to stand by my chair, when my mother was 
talking to me ; and put her hand in mine, and look 
up into my face ; but she did not say a word. I 
thought it was very odd ; and yet it did not seem odd 
to me, that I could say nothing to her. I daresay 
we felt alike. 

At length Ben came running in, and said the 
coach had come ; and there, sure enough, out of the 
window, we saw it — a bright yellow coach, with four 
white horses, and band-boxes all over the top, with a 
great pile of trunks behind. Ben said it was a grand 
coach, and that he should like a ride in it ; and the 
old nurse came to the door, and said I should have a 
capital time ; but somehow, I doubted if the nurse 
was talking honestly. I believe she gave me an 
honest kiss though, — and such a hug ! 

But it was nothing to my mother's. Tom told me 
to be a man, and study like a Trojan ; but I was not 
thinking about study then. There was a tall-boy in 
the coach, and 1 was ashamed to have him see me 



170 Reveries OF a Bacheldr. 

cry ; — so I didn't, at first. But I remember, as I 
looked back, and saw little Isabel run out into the 
middle of the street, to see the coach go off, and the 
curls floating behind her, as the wind freshened, I 
felt my heart leaping into my throat, and the water 
coming into my eyes, — and how just then, I caught 
sight of the tall boy glancing at me, — and how I tried 
to turn it off, by looking to see if I could button up 
my great coat, a great deal lower down than the but- 
ton holes went. 

But it was of no use ; I put my head out of the 
coach window, and looked back, as the little figure of 
Isabel faded, and then the house, and the trees ; and 
the tears did come ; and I smuggled my handkerchief 
outside without turning ; so that I could wipe ray 
eyes, before the tall boy sliould see me. They say 
that these shadows of morning fade, as the sun 
brightens into noon-day ; but they are very dark 
shadows for all that ! 

Let the father, or the mother think long, before 
they send away their boy — before they break the 
home-ties that make a web of infinite fineness and 
soft silken meshes around his heart, and toss him 
aloof into the boy-world, where he must struggle up 
amid bickerings and quarrels, into his age of youth ! 
There are boys indeed rrith little fineness in the tex- 
ture of their hearts, and with little delicacy of soul, 



The. M u k n I n a . 171 

to whom the school in a distant village, is but a va- 
cation from home ; and with whom, a return revives 
all those grosser affections which alone existed be- 
fore ;— just as there are plants which will bear all 
exposure without the wilting of a leaf, and will return 
to the hot-house life, as strong, and as hopeful as 
ever. But there are others, to whom the severance 
from the prattle of sisters, the indulgent fondness of 
a mother, and the unseen influences of the home 
altar, gives a shock that lasts forever ; it is wrench- 
ing with cruel hand, what will bear but little rough- 
ness ; and the sobs with which the adieux arc said, 
are sobs that may come back in the after years, 
strong, and steady, and terrible. 

God have mercy on the boy who learns to sob 
early ! Condemn it as sentiment, if you will ; talk 
as you will of the fearlessness, and strength of the 
boy's heart, — ^yet there belong to many, tenderly 
strung chords of affection which give forth low, and 
gentle music, that consoles, and ripens the ear for all 
the hai-monies of life. These chords a little rude, 
and unnatural tension will break, and break forever. 
Watch your boy then, if so be he will bear the 
strain ; try his nature, if it be rude or delicate ; 
and if delicate, in Grod's name, do not, as you value 
your peace and his, breed a harsh youth spirit in him, 



172 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

that shall take pride in subjugating, and forgetting 
the delicacy, and richness of his finer affections ! 

1 see now, looking into the past, the troops of 

boys who were scattered in the great play-ground, as 
the coach drove up at night. The school was in a 
tall, stately building, with a high cupola on the top, 
where I thought I would like to go up. The school- 
master, they told nie at home, was kind; he said he 
hoped I would be a good boy, and patted me on the 
head ; but he did not pat mc as my mother used to 
do. Then there was a woman, whom they called the 
Matron ; who had a great many ribbons in her cap, 
and who shook my hand, — but so stiffly, that I didn't 
dare to look up in her face. 

One boy took me down to sec the school room, 
which was in the basement, and the walls were all 
mouldy, I remember ; and when we passed a certain 
door, he said, — there was the dungeon ; — how I felt ! 
I hated that boy ; but I believe he is dead now. 
Then the matron took me up to my room, — a little 
corner room, with two beds, and two windows, and a 
red table, and closet ; and my chum was about my 
size, and wore a queer roundabout jacket with big 
bell buttons ; and he called the schoolmaster — ' Old 
Crikey' — and kept me awake half the night, telling 
me how he whipped the scholars, and how they played 



T 11 E M U xM K G . 173 

tricks upoa him. I thought uiy chum was a very 
imcommon boy. 

For a day or two, tha lessons were easy, and it 
was Import to pUiy with so many ' fellows.' But soon I 
began to feel lonely at night after I had gone to bed. 
I used to wish I could have my mother come, and 
kiss me ; after school too, I wished I could step in, 
and tell Isabel how bravely I had got my lessons. 
When I told my chum this, he laughed at me, and 
said that was no place for ' homesick, white-livered 
chaps.' I wondered if my chum had any mother. 

Wo had spending money once a week, with which 
we used to go down to the village store, and club our 
funds together, to make great pitchers of lemonade. 
Some boys would have money besides j though it was 
against the rules ; and one, I recollect, showed us a 
five dollar bill in his wallet — and we all thought he 
must be very rich. 

We marched in procession to the village church 
on Sundays. There were two long benches in the 
galleries, reaching down the side of the meeting- 
house ; and on these we sat. At the first, I was 
among the smallest boys, and took a place close to 
the wall, against the pulpit ; but afterward, as I grew 
bigger, I was promoted to the lower end of the first 
bench. This I never liked ; — because it was close 
bj one of the usher?, and because it brought me next 



174 Reveries ok a Bachelor. 

to some country women, who wore stiff bonnets, md 
eat fennel, and sung with the choir. But there was 
a little black-eyed girl, who sat over behind the choir, 
that I thought handsome ; I used to look at her very 
often ; but was careful she should never catch my 
eye. 

There was another down below, in a corner pew, 
who was pretty ; and who wore a hat in the winter 
trimmed with fur. Half the boys in the school said 
they would marry her some day or other. One's 
name was Jane, and that of the other, Sophia ; which 
we thought pretty names, and cut them on the ice, 
in skating time. But I didn't think either of them 
so pretty as Isabel. 

Once a teacher whipped me : I bore it bravely in the 
school : but afterward, at night, when my chum was 
asleep, I sobbed bitterly, as I thought of Isabel, and 
Ben, and my mother, and how much they loved me ; 
and laying my face in my hands, I sobbed myself to 
sleep. In the morning I was calm enough : — it was 
another of the heart ties broken, though I did not 
know it then. It lessened the old attachment to 
home, because that home could neither protect me, 
nor soothe me with its sympathies. Memory indeed 
freshened and grew strong ; but strong in bitterness, 
and in regrets. The boy whose love you cannot feed 
by daily nourishment, will find prids, self-indulgence. 



T II E M R iN I X G . 175 

and an iron purpose coming in to furnish otner supply 
for the soul that is in him. If he cannot shoot his 
branches into the sunshine, he will become acclimated 
to the shadow, ind indifferent to such atvay gleams of 
sunshine, as his fortune may vouchsafe 

Hostilities would sometimes threaten between the 
school and the village boys ; but they usually passed 
off, with such loud, and harmless explosions, as 
belong to the wars of our small politicians. The 
village champions were a hatter's apprentice, and a 
thick set fellow who worked in a tannery. We prided 
ourselves especially on c.ie stout boy, who ^'ore a 
sailor's monkey jacket. I cannot but think how 
jaunty that stout boy looked in that jacket ; and what 
an Ajax cast there was to his countenance ! It 
certainly did occur to me, to compare him with 
William Wallace (Miss Porter's William Wallace) 
and I thought how I would have liked to have seen 
a tussle between them. Of course, we who were 
small boys, limited ourselves to indignant remai-k, and 
thought ' we should like to see them do it' ; and 
prepared clubs from the wood-shed, after a model 
suggested by a New York boy, who had seen the 
clubs of the Policemen. 

There was one scholar, — poor Leslie, who had 
friends in some foreign country, and who occasionally 
received letters beaijjng a foreign post-mark : — what 



] 76 E E V E 11 1 E s OF A Bachelor. 

an extiaordinarj boy that ^as ; — what astonisLing 
letters ; — what extraordiuary parents ! I wondered 
if I should ever receive a letter from ' foreign parts f' 
1 wondered if I sliould ever write one :--=-but this was 
too much — too absurd ! As if I, Paul, wearing a 
blue jacket with gilt buttons, and number four boots, 
should ever visit those countries spoken of in 
the geographies, and by learned travellers ! No, no ; 
this was too estravagaut : but I knew what I would 
do, if I lived to come of age ; — and I vowed that 1 
would, — I would go to New York ! 

Number seven was the hospital, and forbidden 
ground ; we had all of us a sort of horror of number 
seven. A boy died there once, and oh, how he 
moaned ; and what a time there was when the father 



came 



A scholar by the name of Tom Belton, who wore 
linsey gray, made a dam across a little brook by the 
school, and whittled out a saw-mill, that actually 
sawed : he had genius. I expected to see him 
before now at the head of American mechanics ; but 
I learn with pain, that he is keej^ing a grocery store. 

At the close of all the terms we had exhibitions, 
to which all the towns people came, and among them 
the black-eyed Jane, and the pretty Sophia with fur 
around her hat. My great triumph was when I had 
the part of one of Pizarro's chieftains, the evening 



T H K M O R N I N G . 177 

before I left the school. How I did look ! I had a 
moustache put on with burnt cork, and whiskers very 
bushy indeed ; and I had the militia coat of an 
ensign in the town company, with the skirts pinned 
up, and a short sword very dull, and crooked, which 
belonged to an old gentleman who was said to have 
got it from some privateer, who was said to have taken 
it from some great British Admiral, in the old 
wars : — and the way I carried that sword upon the 
platform, and the way I jerked it out, when it came 
to my turn to say, — ' battle ! battle ! — then death to 
the armed, and chains for the defenceless !' — was 
tremendous ! 

The morning aftor, in our dramatic hats — black 
felt, with turkey feathers, — we took our place upon 
the top of the coach, to leave the school. The head- 
master, in green spectacles, came out to shake hands 
with us, — a very awful shaking of hands. — Poor 
gentleman ! — he is in his grave now. 

We gave three loud hurrahs ' for the old school,' 
as the coach started ; and upon the top of the hill 
that overlooks the village, we gave another round — 
and still another for the crabbed old fellow, whose 
apples we had so often stolen. — I wonder if old 
Bulkeley is living yet .'' 

As we got on under the pine trees, I recalled the 
image of the black-eyed Jane, and of the other Httlo 
8* 



178 Keveries of a Bachelor. 

girl in the corner pew, — and thought how I would 
come back after the college days were over, — a man, 
with a beaver hat, and a cane, and with a splendid 
barouche, and how I would take the best chamber at 
the inn, and astonish the old school-master by giving 
him a familiar tap on the shoulder ; and how I would 
be the admiration, and the wonder of the pretty girl, 
Id the fur-trimmed hat ! Alas, how our thoughts 
outrun our deeds ! 

For long — long years, I saw no more of my old 
school : and when at length the new view came, great 
changes — crashing like tornadoes, — had swept over 
my path ! I thought no more of startling the 
villagers, or astonishing the black-eyed girl. No, no ! 
I was content to slip quietly through the little town, 
with only a tear or two, as I recalled the dead ones, 
and mused upon the emptiness of life ! 



The Se a . 

As I look back, boyhood with its griefs and cares 
vanishes into the proud stateliness of youth. The 
ambition, and the rivalries of the college life, — its 
first boastful importance as knowledge begins to dawn 
on the wakened mind, and the ripe, and enviable 
complacency of its senior dignity, — all scud over my 



T H E M n N I N G . 1 79 

memory, like this morning breeze along the meadows ; 
and like that too, bear upon their wing, a cbillness — 
as of distant ice-banks. 

Ben has grown almost to manhood : Lilly is living 
in a distant home ; and Isabel is just blooming into 
that sweet age, where womanly dignity waits her 
beauty ; — an age that sorely puzzles one who has 
grown up beside her, — making him slow of tongue, 
but very quick of heart ! 

As for the rest let us pass on. 

The sea Js around me. The last headlands have 
gone down, under the horizon, like the city steeples, 
as you lose yourself in the calm of the country, or 
like the great thoughts of genius, as you slip from 
the pages of poets, into your own quiet reverie. 

The waters skirt me right and left : there is no- 
thing but water before, and only water behind 
Above me are sailing clouds, or the blue vault, which 
we call, with childish license — heaven. The sails 
white and full, like helping friends are pushing me 
on ; and night and day are distent with the winds 
which come and go — none knov/ whence, and none 
know whither. A land bird flutters aloft, weary 
with long flying ; and lost in a world where are no 
forests but the careening masts, and no foliage but 
the drifts of spray. It cleaves awhile to the smooth 
spars, till urged by some homeward yearning, it bears 



180 II EYERIES OF A BaCHEL'R. 

off in the face of tlic wind, and sinks, and rises over 
the angry waters, until its strength is gone, and the 
blue waves gather the poor flutterer to their cold, and 
glassy bosom. 

All the morning I see nothing beyond me biit the 
waters, or a tossing company of dolphins ; all the 
noon, unless some white sail — like a ghost, stalks the 
horizon, there is still nothing but the rolling seas ; all 
the evening, after the sun has grown big and sunk 
under the water line, and the moon risen, white and 
cold, to glimmer across the tops of the surging ocean, 
• — there is nothing but the sea, and the sky, to lead 
off thought, or to crush it with their greatness. 

Hour after hour, as I sit in the moonlight upon the 
taffrail, the great waves gather far back, and break, — 
and gather nearer, and break louder, — and gather 
again, and roll down swift and terrible under the 
creaking ship, and heave it up lightly upon their 
swelling surge, and drop it gently to their seething, 
and yeasty cradle, — like an infant in the swaying arms 
of a mother, — or like a shadowy memory, upon the 
billows of manly thought. 

Conscience wakes in the silent nights of ocean ; 
life lies open like a book, and spreads out as level as 
the sea. Regrets and broken resolutions chase over 
the soul like swift-winged night-birds, and all the un- 
steady hoiahth- and the wastes of action, lift up dis- 



The Morning. 181 

tinct, and clear, from the uueasy, but Jirapid depths 
of memory. 

Yet within this floating world I am upon, sympa- 
thies are narrowed down ; they cannot range, as 
upon the land, over a thousand objects. You arc 
strangely attracted toward some frail girl, whose pal- 
lor has now given place to the rich bloom of the sea 
life. You listen eagerly to the chance snatches of a 
song from below, in the long morning watch. You 
love to see her small feet tottering on the unsteady 
deck ; and you love greatly to aid her steps, and feel 
her weight upon your arm, as the ship lurches to a 
heavy sea. 

Hopes and fears knit together pleasantly upon the 
ocean. Each day seems to revive them ; your morn- 
ing salutation, is like a welcome after absence, upon 
the shore ; and each ' good night' has the depth and 
fullness of a land 'farewell.' And beauty grows 
upon the ocean ; you cannot certainly say that the 
face of the fair girl-voyager is prettier than that of 
Isabel ; — oh, no ! — but you are certain that you cast 
innocent, and honest glances upon her, as you steady 
her walk upon the deck, far oftener than at the first ; 
and ocean life, and sympatli}', makes her kind ; she 
does not resent your rudeness, one half so stoutly, as 
she might upon the shore. 

She will even linger of an evening — pleading first 



182 R EVER IKS OF A BACHELOR. 

with the mother, and standing heside you, — her 
white hand not very far from yours upon the rail, — 
look down where the black ship flings off with each 
plunge, whole garlands of emeralds ; or she will look 
up (thinking perhaps you are looking the same way) 
into the skies, in search of some stars — which were 
her neighbors at home. And bits of old tales will 
come up, as if they rode upon the ocean quietude ; 
and fragments of half fo)-gotten poems, tremulously 
uttered, — either by reason of the rolling of the ship, 
or some accidental touch of that white hand. 

But ocean has its storms, when fear will make 
strange, and holy companionship ; and even here, my 
memory shifts swiftly and suddenly. 

It is a dreadful night. The passengers are 

clustered, trembling, below. Every plank shakes ; 
and the oak ribs groan, as if they suffered with their 
toil. The hands are all aloft ; the captain is forward 
shouting to the mate in the cross-trees, and I am 
clinging to one of the stanchions, by the binnacle. 
The ship is pitching madly, and the waves are top- 
pling up, sometimes as high as the yard-arm, and 
then dipping away with a whirl under our keel, that 
makes every timber in the vessel quiver. The thun- 
der is roaring like a thousand cannons ; and at the 
moment, the sky is cleft with a stream of fire, that 
glares over the tops of the waves, and glistens on the 



T H E M O R N I N G . 183 

wet decks, and the spars, — lighting up all so plain, 
that I can see the men's faces in the main-top, and 
catch glimpses of the reefers on the yard-arm, cling- 
ing like death ; — then all is horrible darkness. 

The spray spits angrily against the canvass ; the 
waves crash against the weather-bow like mountains ; 
the wind howls through the rigging, or, as a gaskefc 
gives way, the sail bellying to leeward, splits like the 
crack of a musket. I hear the captain in the lulls, 
screaming out orders ; and the mate in the rigging, 
screaming thenl over, until the lightning comes, and 
the thunder, deadening their voices, as if they were 
chirping sparrows. 

In one of the flashes, I see a hand upon the yard- 
arm lose his foothold, as the ship gives a plunge ; 
but his arms are clenched around the spar. Before 
I can see any more, the blackness comes, and the 
thunder, with a crash that half deafens me. I think 
I hear a low cry, as the mutterings die away in 
the distance ; and at the next flash of lightning, 
which comes in an instant, I sec upon the top of one 
of the waves alongside, the poor reefer who has 
fallen. The lightning glares upon his face. 

But he has caught at a loose bit of running rig- 
ging, as he fell ; and I see it slipping oiF the coil 
upon the deck. I shout madly — man overboard ! — 
and catch the rope, when I can see nothing again. 



184 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

The sea is too tigli, and tba man too heavy for nie 
I shout, and shout, and shout, and feel the j^erspira- 
tion starting in great beads from my forehead, as the 
line slips through my fingers. 

Presently the captain fe^ls his way aft, and takes 
hold with me ; and the cook comes, as the coil is 
nearly spent, and we pull together upon him. It is 
desperate work for the sailor ; for the ship is drifting 
at a prodigious rate ; but he clings like a dying man. 
By and by at a flash, we see him on a crest, two 
oars length away from the vessel. 

" Hold on, my man !" shouts the captain. 
" For God's sake, be quick !" says the poor fellow ; 
and he goes down in a trough of the sea. We pull 
the harder, and the captain keeps calling to him to 
keep up courage, and hold strong. But in the hush, 
we can hear him say — " I can't hold out much 
longer ; — I'm most gone !" 

Presently we have brought the man where we can 
lay hold of him, and are only waiting for a good lift 
of the sea to bring him up, when the poor fellow 
groans out, — " It's no use — I can't — good bye !" 
And a wave tosses the end of the rope, clean upon 
the bulwarks. 

At the next flash, I see him going down under the 
water. 

I grope my wa} bebw, sick and faint at heart; 



T H E I'd R N I N G . 185 

and wodgiug myself into my narrow birth, I try to 
sleep. But the thunder and the tossing of the ship, 
and the face of the drowning man, as he said good bye, — ■ 
peering at me from every corner, will not let me sleep. 

Afterward, come quiet seas, over which we boom 
along, leaving in our track, at night, a broad path of 
phosphorescent splendor. The sailors bustle around 
the decks, as if they had lost no comrade ; and the 
voyagers losing the pallor of fear, look out earnestly 
for the land. 

At length, my eyes rest upon the coveted fields of 
Britain ; and in a day more, the bright face, looking 
out beside me, sparkles at sight of the sweet cottages, 
which lie along the green Esses shores. Broad sailed, 
yachts, looking strangely, yet beautifully, glide upon 
the waters of the Thames, like swans ; black, squai-e- 
rigged colliers from the Tyue, lie grouped in sooty 
cohorts ; and heavy, three-decked Indiamen, — of 
which I had read in story books, — drift slowly down 
with the tide. Dingy steamers, with white pipes, 
and with red pipes, whiz past us to the sea ; and 
now, my eye rests on the great palace of Greenwich ; 
I see the wooden-legged pensioners smoking under 
the palace walls ; and above them upon the hill — as 
Heaven is true — that old, fabulous Greenwich, the 
great "centre of school -boy Longitude. 

Presently, from under a cloud of murky smoke 



186 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

heaves up the vast dome of St. Paul's, and the tall 
Column of the Fire, and the white turrets of London 
Tower. Our ship glides through the massive dock 
gates, and is moored, amid that forest of masts, which 
bears golden fruit for Britons. 

That night, I sleep far away from ' the old school,' 
and far away from the valley of Hillfarm ; long, and 
late, I toss upon my bed, with swift visions in my 
mind, of London Bridge, and Temple Bar, and Jane 
Shore, and FalstafF, and Prince Hal, and King 
Jamie. And when at length I fall asleep, my 
dreams are very pleasant, but they carry me across 
the ocean, away from the ship, — away from London, 
— away even from the fair voyager, — to the old oaks, 
and to the brooks, and — to tby side — sweet Isabel • 



The Father-Land. 

There is a great contrast between the easy 
deshabille of the ocean life, and the prim attire, 
and conventional spirit of the land. In the first, 
there are but few to please, and these few are known, 
and they know us ; upon the shore, there is a world 
to humour, and a world of strangers. lu a brilliant 
drawing-room looking out upon the site of old Char- 
ing-Crops, and upon the one-armed Nelson, standing 



The Mokning. 187 

aloft at his coil of rope, I take leave of the fair 
voyager of the sea. Her white neglige has given 
plac3 to silks ; and the simple careless coifFe of the 
ocean, is replaced by the rich dressing of a modiste. 
Yet her face has the same bloom upon it ; and her 
eye sparkles, as it seems to me, with a higher pride ; 
— and her little hand has I think a tremulous quiver 
in it, (I am sure my own has) — as I bid her adieu, 
and take up the trail of my wanderings into the heart 
of England. 

Abuse her, as we will, — pity her starving peasant- 
ry, as we may, — smile at her court pageantry, as 
inuch as we like, — old England, is dear old England 
still ! Her cottage homes, her green fields, her 
castles, her blazing firesides, her church spires are as 
old as song ; and by song and story, we inhoiit them 
iu our hearts. This joyous boastj was, I remember, 
upon my lip, as I first trode upon the rich meadow 
of Runnymede ; and recalled that GtReat Charter 
wrested from the king, which made the first stepping 
stone toward the bounties of our western freedom. 

It is a strauge feeling that comos over the Western 
Saxon, as he strolls first along the green bye-lanes of 
England, and scents the hawthorn in its April bloom, 
and lingers at some quaint stile, to watch the rooks 
wheeling and cawing around some lofty elm tops, and 
traces the carved gables of some old country mansion 



188 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

that lies ia their shadow, and hums some fragment of 
charming English poesj, that seems made for the 
scene ! This is not sight-seeing, nor travel ; it is 
dreaming sweet dreams, that are fed with the old life 
of Books. ;* 

I wander on, fearing to break the dream, by a 
swift step ; and winding and rising between the 
blooming hedgerows, I come presently to the sight 
of some sweet valley below me, where a thatched 
hamlet lies sleeping ia the April sun, as quietly as the 
dead lie in history ; — no sound , reaches me save the 
occasional clinck of the smith's hammer, or the 
hedgeman's bill-hook, or the ploughman's ' ho-tup !' 
from the hills. At evening, listening to the night- 
ingale, I stroll wea.vily into some close-nestled village, 
that I had seen long ago from a rolling height.' 
It is far away from the great lines of travel ; — and 
the children stop their play to have a look at me, and 
rosy-faced girls peep from behind half-opened doors. 

Standing apart, and with a bench on either side of 
the entrance, is the inn of the Eagle and the Falcon, 
— which guardian birds, some native Dick Tinto has 
pictured upon the swinging sign-board at the corner. 
The hostess is half ready to embrace me, and treats 
me like a prince in disguise. She shows me through 
the tap-room into a little parlor, with white curtains, 
and with neatly framed prints of the old patriarcha 



T II E M R >- I N G . 1 89 

Here, alone, beside a brisk fire, kindled with furze, I 
watch the white flame leaping playfully through the 
black lumps of coal, and enjoy the best fare of the 
Eagle and the Falcon. If too late, or too early for 
her garden stock, the hostess bethinks herself of some 
small pot of jelly in an out-of-the-way cupboard of the 
house, and setting it temptingly in her prettiest dish, 
she coyly slips it upon the white cloth, with a modest 
regret that it is no better ; and a little evident satis- 
faction — that it is so good. 

I muse for an hour before the glowing fire, as 
quiet as the cat that has come in, to bear me com- 
f)any ; and at bed-time, I find sheets, as fresh as the 
air of the mountains. 

At another time, and many months later, I am 
walking under a wood of Scottish firs. It is near 
night-fall, and the fir tops are swaying, and sighing 
hoarsely, in the cool wind of the Northern Highlands. 
There is none of the smiling landscape of England 
about me ; and the crags of Edinburgh and Castle 
Stirling, and sweet Perth, in its silver valley, are far 
to the southward. The larchs of Athol and Bruar 
Water, and that highland gem — Dunkeld, are passed. 
I am tired with a morning's tramp over Culloden 
Moor ; and from the edge of the wood, there stretches 
before me in the cool gray twilight, broad fields of 
leather. In the middle, there rise against the 



190 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

night-sky, the turrets of a castle ; it is Castle Cawdor, 
where King Duncan was murdered by Macbeth. 

The sight of it lends a spur to my weary step ; and 
emerging from the wood, I bound over the springy 
heather. In an hour, I clamber a broken wall, and 
come under the frowning shadows of the castle. The 
ivy clambers up here, and there, and shakes its 
uncropped branches, and its dried berries over the 
heavy portal. I cross the moat, and my step makes 
the chains of the draw-bridge rattle. All is kept in 
the old state ; only in lieu of the warder's horn, I 
pull at the warder's bell. The echoes ring, and 
die in the stone courts ; but there is no one astir, nor 
is there a light at any of the castle windows. I ring 
again, and the echoes come, and blend with the rising 
night wind that sighs around the turretSj as they 
sighed that night of murder. I fancy — it must be a 
fancy, — that I hear an owl scream ; I am sure that I 
hear the crickets cry. 

I sit down upon the green bank of the moat ; a 
little dark water lies in the bottom. The walls rise 
from it gray, and stern in the deepening shadows. 
I hum chance passages of Macbeth, listening -for the 
echoes — echoes from the wall ; and echoes from- that 
far away time when I stole the first reading of the 
tragic story. 



The Morning. 191 

" Dids't tliou not hear a noise ' 
I heard the owl scream, and the crickets cry. 
Did not you speak ? 

When ? 

Now. 

As I descended ? 
Ay. 
Hark!" 

And the sharp echo comes back ' hark !' And 

at dead of night, in the thatched cottage under the 
castle walls, where a dark faced, Gl-aelic woman, in plaid 
turban, is my hostess, I wake, startled by the wind, 
and my trembling lips say involuntarily — ' hark !' 

Again, three months later, I am in the sweet 
county of Devon. Its valleys are like emerald ; its 
threads of water stretched over the fields, by their 
provident husbandry, glisten in the broad glow of 
summer, like skeins of silk. A bland old farmer, of 
the true British stamp, is my host. On market days 
he rides over to the old town of Totness in a trim, 
black farmer's cart ; and he wears glossy topped 
boots, and a broad-brimmed white hat. I take a vast 
deal of pleasure in listening to his honest, straight- 
forward talk about the improvements of the day ant^ 
the state of the nation. I sometimes get upon one of 
his nags, and ride off with him over his fields, oi 
visit the homes of the laborers, which show their gray 



192 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

roofs, in every charming nook of tlie landscape. At 
the parish church, I doze against the high pew backs, 
as I listen to the see-saw tones of the drawling curate ; 
and in my half wakeful moments, the withered holly 
sprigs (not removed since Easter) grow upon my 
vision, into Christmas boughs, and preach sermons to 
me — of the days of old. 

Sometimes, I wander far over the hills into a 
neighboring park ; and spend hours on hours, under 
the sturdy oaks, watching the sleek fallow deer, 
gazing at me with their soft, liquid eyes. The 
squirrels, too, play above me, with their daring leaps, 
utterly careless of my presence, and the pheasants 
whir away from my very feet. 

On one of these random strolls — 1 remember it 
very well — when I was idluig along, thinking of the 
broad reach of water that lay between me, and that 
old forest home, — and beating off the daisy heads 
with my cane, — I heard the tramp of horses, coming 
up one of the forest avenues. The sound was 
unusual, for the family, I had been told, was still in 
town, and no light of way lay through the park. 
There they were, however : — I was sure it must be 
the family, fronj the careless way in which they came 
sauntering up. 

First, there was a noble hound that came bounding 
toward me, — gazed a moment, and turned to watch 



The Morning. 193 

the approach of the littlj cavalcaJc. Nest was an 
elderly gentleman mounted upon a spirited hunter, 
attended by a boy of soma doz^n years, who managed 
his pony with a grace, that is a part of the English 
boy's education. Then followed two older lads, 
and a travelling phreton, in which sat a couple 
of elderly ladies. But what most drew my attention 
was a girlish figure, that rode beyond the carriage, 
upon a sleek-limbed gray. There was something 
in the easy grace of her attitude, and the rich 
glow that lit up her face — heightened as it was, 
by "the little black velv3t liding cap, relieved with a 
single flowing plume,— that kept my eye. It was 
strange, but I thought that I had seen such a figure 
before, and such a face, and such an eye ; and as I 
made the ordinary salutation of a stranger, and 
caught her smile, I could have sworn that it was she — 
my fair companion of the ocean. The truth flashed 
upon me in a moment. She was to visit, she had told 
me, a friend in the south of England ; — and this was 
the friend's home ;— and one of the ladies of the 
carriage was her mother ; and one of the lads, the 
eehool-boy brother, who had teased her on the sea. 

I recal now perfectlj'-, her frank manner, as she 
ungloved her hand to bid me welcome. I strolled 
beside them to the steps. Old Devon had suddenly 
lenewed its beauties for me. I had much to tell her, 



194 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

of the little out-lying nooks, which my wayward feet 
had led me to : and she — as much to aek. My stay 
with the bland old farmer lengthened ; and two days 
hospitalities at the Park ran over into three, and four. 
There was hard galloping down those avenues ; and 
new strolls, not at all lonely, under the sturdy oaks. 
The loQ^ summer twili'jht of Ene-land used to find a 
very happy fellow lingering on the garden terrace, — 
looking, now at the rookery, where the belated birds 
quarreled for a resting place, and now down the long 
forest vista, gray with distance, and cLsed with the 
white spire of Modbury church. 

English country lii'e gains fast \ipon one — very 
fast; and it is not so easy, as in the drawing-room of 
Charing Cross, to say — adieu ! But it is said — very 
sadly said ; for God only knows how long it is to last. 
And as I rode slowly down toward the lodge jsftermy 
leave-taking, I turned back again, and ngain, and 
again. I thought I saw her standing still upon tlie 
terrace, though it was almost dark ; and I thought — 
it could hardly have been an illusion — that I saw 
something white waving from her hand. 

Her name — as if I could forget it — was Caroline ; 
her mother called her — Carry. I wondered how it 
■would seem for me to call her — Carry ! 1 tried it ; — 
it sounded well. I tried it — over and over,— until I 
came too near the lodge. There I thiew a half 



The M o r n I n g . 195 

crown to the woman who opsned the gate for me. 
She cuitsied low, and said — '' God bless you, sh- !" 

I liked her for it ; I would have given a guinea for 
it : and that night, — whether it v/as the old woman's 
benediction, or the waving scarf upon the terrace, J 
do not know ; — but there was a charm upon my 
thought, and my hope, as if an angel had been near 
me. 

It passed away though in my dreams ; — for I 
dreamed that I saw the sweet face of Bella in an 
English park, and that she wore a black velvet riding 
cap, with a plume ; and I came up to her and 
murmured, very sweetly, I thought, — " Carry, dear 
Carry !" and she started, looked sadly at me, and 
turned away. I ran after her, to kiss her as I did 
when she sat upon my mother's lap, on the day when 
she came near drowning : I longed to tell her, as I 
did then — I do love you. But she turned her tearful 
face upon ma, I dreamed ; and then, — I saw no more. 



A Roman Girl. 

— I REMEMBER the Very words — " non parlo Fraii- 
cesce, Signore, — I do not speak French, Si.<5nor" — 
said the stout lady, — " but m}- daughter, perhaps, will 
undei stand you." 



196 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

And she called — " Enrica ! — Enrica ! venite, 
subiio ! ce un foresticre.'''' 

And the daughter came, her light brown hair fall- 
ing carelessly over her shoulders, her rich hazel eye 
twinkling and full of life, the colour coming and going 
upon her transparent cheek, and her bosom heaving 
"with her quick step. With one hand she put back 
the scattered locks that had fallen over her fore- 
head, wliile she laid the other gently, upon the arm 
of her mother, and asked in that sweet music of the 
south — " cosa volete, mamma V 

It was the prettiest picture I had seen in many a 
day ; and this, notwithstanding I was in Rome, and had 
come that very morning from the Palace ofBorghese. 
The stout lady was my hostess, and Enrica — so fair, 
so young, so unlike in her beauty, to other Italian 
beauties, was my landlady's daughter. The house 
was one of those tall houses — very, very old, which 
stand along the eastern side of the Corso, looking out 
upon the Piazzo di Colonna. The staircases were 
very tall, and dirty, and they were narrow and dark. 
Four flights of stone steps led up to the corridor 
where they lived. A little trap was in the door ; and 
there was a bell- rope, at the least touch of which, I 
was almost sure to hear tripping feet run along the 
stone floor within, and then to see the trap thrown 
slyly back, and those deep liazle eyes looking out 



The U o It :,- i n g . 197 

upon me :, and then the door would open, and along 
the corridor, under the daughter's guidance, (until I 
had learned tha way,) I passed to my Roman home. 
1 was a long time learning the way. 

My chamber looked out upon the Corso, and I could 
catch from it a glimpse of the top of the tall column 
of Antoninus, and of a fragment of the palace of the 
Governor, My parlor, which was separated from the 
apartments of the family by a narrow corridor, looked 
upon a small court, hung around with balconies. 
From the upper one, a couple of black-eyed girls are 
occasionally looking out, and they can almost read 
the title of rcy book, when I sit by the window. Be- 
low are three or four blooming ragazze, who are 
dark-eyed, and have Roman luxuriance of hair. The 
youngest is a friend of our Enrica, and is of course 
frequently looking up, with all the innocence in the 
world, to see if Enrica may be looking out. 

Night after night, a bright blaze glows upon my 
hearth, of the alder faggots which they bring from the 
Albanian hills. Night after night too, the family 
come in, to aid my blundering speech, and to enjoy 
the rich sparkling of my faggot fire. Little Cesare, a 
dark-faced Italian boy, takes up his position with pen- 
cil and slate, and draws by the light of the blaze 
genii and castles. The old one-eyed teacher of 
Enrica, lays hi.s snuff box upon the table, and his 



198 Pi EYERIES OF A }3aCPIEL0R. 

handkerchief across his hip, and with his spectacles 
upon his nose, and his big fingers on the lesson, runs 
through the French tenses of the vei-b amare. The 
father a sallow-faced, keen- eyed man, with true 
Italian visage, sits with his arms upon the elbows of 
his chair, and talks of the Pope, or of the weather. 
A spruce count from the Marches of Ancona, wears 
a heavy watch seal, and reads Dante with furore. 
The mother, with arras akimbo, looks proudly upon 
her daughter, and counts her, as well she niay, a gem 
among the Roman beauties. 

The table was round, with the fire blazing on one 
side ; there was scarce room for but three upon the 
other. Signor il maestro was one — then Enrica, and 
next — how well I remember it — came myself. For I 
could sometimes help Enrica to a word of French ; 
and far oftener, she could help me to a word of 
Italian. Her face was rich, and full of feeling; I 
used greatly to love to watch the puzzled expressions 
that passed over her forehead, as the sense of some 
hard phrase escaped her ; — and better still, to see the 
happy smile, as she caught at a glance, the thought 
of some old scholastic Frenchman, and transferred it 
into the liquid melody of her speech. 

She had seen just sixteen summers, and only that 
very autumn was escaped from the thraldom of a 
convent, upon th^^ «kirts of Home. She knew nothing 



The Morning. 199 

of life, but the life of feeling ; and all thoughts of 
happiness, lay as yet in her childish hopes. It was 
pleasant to look upon hei* face ; and it was still more 
pleasant to listen to that sweet Roman voice. What a 
rich flow of superlatives, and endearing diminutives, 
from those vermillion lips ! Who would not have 
loved the study, and who would not have loved — 
without meaning it — the teacher } 

In those days, I did not linger long cat the tables 
of lame Pietro in the Via Oondotti ; but would hurry 

back to my little Roman parlor the fire was so 

pleasant ! And it was so pleasant to greet Enrica 
with her mother, even before the one-eyed maestro 
had come in ; and it was pleasant to unfold the book 
between us, and to lay my hand upon the page — a 
small page — where hers lay already. And when she 
pointed wrong, it was pleasant to correct her — over 
and over ; — insisting, that her hand should be here, 
and not there, and lifting those little fingers from one 
page, and putting them down upon the other. And 
sometimes, half provoked with my fault-finding, she 
would pat my hand smartly with hers ; — but when I 
looked in her face to know what that could mean, she 
would meet my eye with such a kind submission, and 
half earnest regret, as made me not only pardon the 
offence, — but tempt me to provoke it again. 

Through all the days of Carnival, when I rode 



200 Reveuiesof a Jjaciie or. 

pelted with confetti, and pelting back, my eyes used to 
wandei- up, from a long way off, to that tall house 
upon the Corso, where I was sure to meet, ajraiu and 
again, those forgiving eyes, and that soft brown hair, 
all gathered under the little biown sombrero, set off 
with one pure white plume. And her hand full of 
bon-bons, she would shake at me threateningly ; and 
laugh — a musical laugh — as I bowed my head to the 
assault, and recovering from the shower of missiles, 
would turn to throw my stoutest bouquet at her bal- 
cony. At night, I would bear home to the Iloman 
parlor, my best trophy of the day, as a guerdon for 
Enriea ; and Enrica would be sure to render in 
acknowledgment, some carefully hidden flowers, the 
prettiest that her beauty had won. 

Sometimes upon those Carnival nights, she arrays 
herself in the costume of the Albanian water-carriers ; 
and nothing, one would think could be prettier, than 
the laced crimson jacket, and the strange head gear 
vith its trinkets, and the short skirts leaving to view 
)i3 delicate an ankle as could be found in Rome. 
Upon another night, she glides into my little parlor, 
as we sit by the blaze, in a close velvet boddice, and 
with a Swiss hat caught up by a looplet of silver, and 
adorned with a full blown rose — nothing you think 
could be prettier than this. Again, in one of her 
girlish freaks, she robes herself like a nun ; and with 



The Morning. 201 

the heav^ black sergo, for dress, and the funereal 
veil, — relieved only bj the plain white ruffle of her 
cap — you wish she were always a nun. But the wish 
vanishes, when you see her in a pure white muslin, 
with a wreath of orange blossoms about her forehead, 
and a single white rose-bud in her bosom. 

Upon the little balcony Enrica keeps a pot or two 
of flowers, which bloom all winter long : and each 
morning, I find upon my table a fresh rose bud ; each 
night, I bear back for thank-offering, the prettiest 
bouquet that can be found in the Via Condotti. The 
quiet fire-side evenings come back ;— in which my 
hand seeks its wont.^l place upon her book ; and ray 
other, loiLl creep around upon the back of Enrica's 
cliair, and Elnrica icill louk indignant, — and then all 
forgiveness. 

One day I received a large pacquet of letters : — ■ 
ah, what luxury to lis back in my big arm-chair, 
there before the crackling faggots, with the pleasant 
rustle of that silken dress beside me, and run 
over a second, and a third time, those mute paper 
missives, which bore to me over so many miles of 
water, the words of greeting, and of love ! It would 
be worth travelling to the shores of the iEgean, to 
find one's heart quickened into such life as the ocean 
letters will make. Enrica threw down her book, 
and wondered what could be in th-m 'i — and snatched 



202 Eeveuies of a Bachelor. 

one from my hand, and looked with sad, but vain 
intensity over that strange scrawl. — What can it 
be ? — said she ; and she laid her finger upon the little 
half line— " Dear Paul." 

I told her it was — " Caro mioy 

Enrica laid it upon her lap, and looked in my face j 
" It is from 3^our mother ?" said she. 

" No," said I. 

*' From your sister ?" — said she. 

" Alas, no !" 

" II vostro frntello^ climque ?" 

" Nevimeno'''' — said I — " not from a brother either." 

She handed me the letter, and took up her book ; 
and presently she laid the book down again ; and 
looked at the letter, and then at me ; — and went out. 

She did not come in again that evening ; in the 
morning, there was no rose-bud on my table. And 
when I came at night,with a bouquet from Pietro's 
at the corner, she asked me — " who had written my 
letter r" 

" A very dear friend," said I. 

" A lady ?" continued she. 

" A lady," said I. 

" Keep this bouquet for her," said she, and put it 
in my hands. 

" But, Enrica, she has plenty of flowers : she 



T J I E Morning. 203 

lives among them, and each morning her children 
gather them by scores to make garlands of." 

Enrica put her fingers within my hand to take 
again the bouquet ; and for a moment I held both 
fingers and flowers. 

The flowers slipped out first. 

I had a friend at Rome in that time, who afterward 
died between Ancona and Corinth : we were sitting 
one day upon a block of tufa in the middle of the 
Coliseum, looking up at the shadows which the 
waving shrubs upon the southern wall, cast upon the 
ruined arcades within, and listening to the chirping 
sparrows tlint lived upon the wreck, — when he said to 
me suddenly — "Paul, you love the Italian girl." 

" She is very beautiful," said I. 

" I think she is b3ginning to love you," said he, 
soberly. 

" She has a very warm heart, I believe," said I. 

" Aye," said he. 

" But her feelings are those of a girl," continued I. 

" They are not," said my friend ; and he laid his 
hand upon my knee, and left oiF drawing diagrams 
with his cane, — " I have seen, Paul, more than you 
of this southf^rn nature. The Italian girl of fifteen 
is a woman ; — an impassioned, sensitive, tender 
creature — yet still a woman : you are loving — if you 



204 11 E V E R I i: s OF A Bachelor. 

love — a full-grown heart ; she is loving- — if !.he 
loves — as a ripe heart should." 

" J)Ut 1 do no^ think that either is wholly true," 
said I. 

" Try it," said he, setting his cane down firmly, 
and looking in my face. 

" How .'" returned I. 

" I have three weeks upon my hands," continued 
he. " Go with me into the Appenines ; leave your 
home in the Corso, and see if you can forget in the 
air of the mountains, your blue-eyed Roman girl !" 

I was pondering for an answer, when he went on :— • 
" It is better so : love as you might, that southern 
nature with all its passion, is not the material to 
build domestic happiness upon ; nor is your northern 
habit — whatever you may think at your time of life, 
the one to cherish always those passionate sympathies 
which are bred by this atmosphere, and their scenes." 

One moment my thought ran to my little parlor, 
and to that fairy figure, and to that sweet, angel 
face : and then, like lightning it traversed oceans, and 
fed upon the old ideal of home, and brought images 
to my eye of lost — dead ones, who seemed to be 
stirring on heavenly wings, in that soft Roman 
atmosphere, with greetir , and with beckoning. 

" I will go w'.h you," said I. 

The fatlier slirugged hk shoulders, when I told 



T HE Mo R X X N G . 205 

him I was going to the mountains, and '.vauted a 
guide. His wife said it would be cold upon the hills, 
for the winter was not ended. Enrica said it would 
be warm in the valleys, for the spring was coming. 
The old man drummed with his fingers on the tabic, 
and shrugged his shoulders again, but said nothing. 

My landlady said I could not ride. Cesare said it 
would be hard walking. Enrica asked papa, if there 
would be any danger ? And again the old man 
shrugged his shoulders. Again I asked him, if he 
knew a man who would serve us as guide among the 
Appenines ; and finding me determined, he shruco-ed 
his shoulders, and said he would find one the next 
day. 

As I passed out at evening, on my way to the 
Piazzo near the Monte Citorio, where stand the 
carriages that go out to Tivoli, Enrica glided up to 

me, and whispered — " rt/i, ?«i displace taiito taiitoy 

Signor .'" 

The Appenines. 

I SHOOK her hand, and in an hour afterward was 
passing with my friend, by tlie Trajan forum, toward 
the deep shadow of San IMaggiore, which lay in our 
way to the mountains. At sunset, we were wandering 
over the ruin o; Adiinn's villa, which lies upon the 



206 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

first step of the Appeuines. Behind us, the vesper 
bells of Tivoli were sounding, and their echoes 
floating sweetly under the broken arches ; before us, 
stretching all the way to the horizon, lay the broad 
Campagna ; while in the middle of its great waves, 
turned violet-coloured, by the hues of twilight, rose 
the grouped towers of the Eternal City ; and lording 
it among them all, like a giant, stood the black dome 
of St. Peter's. 

Day after day we stretched on over the mountains, 
leavino- the Campagna far behind us. Rocks and 
stones, huge and ragged, lie strewed over the surface 
right and left ; deep yawning valleys lie in the 
shadows of mountains, that loom up thousands of 
feet, bearing perhaps upon their tops old castellated 
towns, perched like birds' nests. But mountain and 
valley are blasted and scarred; the forests even, are 
not continuous, but struggle for a livelihood ; as if 
the brimstone fire that consumed Nineveh, had with- 
ered their energies. Sometimes, our eyes rest on a 
great white scar of the broken calcareous rock, on 
which the moss cannot grow, and the lizards dare not 
creep. Then we see a cliff beetling far aloft, with 
the shining walls of some monastery of holy men glis- 
tening at its base. The wayside brooks do not seem 
to be the gentle oflFspring of bountiful hills, but the 
remnants of something greater, whose greatness has 



T H E M K N 1 N G . 207 

expired ; — they are turbid rills, rolling in the bottom 
of jav,-niug chasms. Even the shrubs have a look, as 
if the Volscian war-horse had trampled them dow^n to 
death ; and the primroses and the violets by the 
mountain path, alone look modestly beautiful amid 
the ruin. 

Sometimes, we loiter in a valley, above which the 
goats are browsing on the cliffs, and listen to the sweet 
pastoral pipes of the Appenines. We see the shep- 
herds in their rough skin coats, high over our heads. 
Their herds are feeding, as it seems, on ledges of a 
hand's breadth. The sweet sound floats and lingers 
in the soft atmosphere, without a breath of wind to 
bear it away, or a noise to disturb its melody. The 
shadows slant more and more as we linger ; and the 
kids begin to group together. And as we wander on, 
through the stunted vineyards in the bottom of the 
valley, the sweet sound flows after u.s, like a river of 
eong, — nor leaves us, till the kids have vanished in 
the distance, and the Clio's themselves, become one 
dark wall of shadow. 

At night, in some little meagre mountain town, we 
stroll about in the narrow pass-ways, or wander under 
the heavy arches of the mountain churches. Shuf- 
fling old women grope in and out ; dim lamps glim- 
mer faintly at the side altars, shedding horrid light 
upon painted images of the dying Christ. Or per- 



208 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

haps, to make the old pilj more soh^mn, there standi 
some bier in the middle, with a figure or two kneeling 
at the foot, and ragged boj's move stealthily under 
the shadows of the columns. Presently comes a 
young priest, in black robes, and lights a taper at the 
foot, and another at the head — for there is a dead 
man on the bier ; and the parched, thin features look 
awfully under the yellow light of the tapeis, in the 
gloom of the great building. It is veiy, very damp 
in the church, and the body of the dead man seems 
to make the air heavy, so we go out into the starlight 
again. 

In the morning, the western slopes wear broad 
shadows, and the frosts crumple, on the herbage, to 
our tread : across the valley, it is like summer ; and 
the birds — for there are songsters in the Appenines, — 
make summer music. Their notes blend softly 
with the faint sounds of some far oif convent bell, 
tolling for morning mass, and strike the frosted 
and shaded mountain side, with a sweet echo. As 
we toil on, and the shaded hills begin to glow in the 
sunshine, we pass a train of mules, loaded with wine. 
We have seen them an hour before — little black dots 
twining along the white streak of foot-way upon the 
mountain above us. We lost them as we began to 
ascend, until a wild snatch of an Appenine song 
turned our eyes up, and there, straggling through the 



The JI I! n I n g . 209 

6rusli, they appeared again ; a fuot slip would have 
brought the mules aad wiue casks rolling upon us. 
We keep still, holding by the bruslnvood, to let them 
pass. An hour more, and we see thsm toiling slowly, — 
mule and muleteer, — big dots, and little dots, — far 
down where we have been before. The sun is hot 
and smoking on them in the bare valleys ; the sun is 
hot and smoking on the hill-side, where we are toiling 
over the broken stones. I thought of little Enrica, 
when she said the spring was coming ! 

Time and again, we sit down together — my friend 
and I — upon some fragment of rock, under the 
broad-armed chestnuts, that fringe the lower skirts of 
the mountains, and talk through the hottest of the 
noon, of the warriors of Scylla, and of the Sabine 
women, — but oftener — of the pretty peasantry, and 
of the sweet-faced Roman girl. He too tells me of 
his life and loves, and of the hopes that lie misty 
and grand before him : — little did we think that in so 
few years, his hopes would be gone, and his body 
lying low in the Adriatic, or tost with the drift upon 
the Dalmatian shores ! Little did I think, that here 
under the ancestral wood, — still a wishful and blun- 
dering mortal, I should be gathering up the shreds, 
that memory can catch of our Appenine wandering, 
and be weaving them into my bachelor dreams. 

Away again upon the quick wing of thought, I 



210 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

follow our steps, as aftei* weeks of wandering, we gained 
once more a height that overlooked the Campagna — 
and saw the sun setting on its edge, throwing into 
relief the dome of St. Peter's, and blazing in a red 
stripe upon the waters of the Tiber. 

Below us was Palestrina — the Prgeneste of the poets 
and philosophers 5 — the dwelling place of — I know 
not how many — Emperors. We went straggling 
through the dirty streets, searching for some tidy- 
looking osteria. At length, we found an old lady, 
who could give us a bed, but uo dinner. My friend 
dropped in a chair disheartened. A snub-looking 
priest came out to condole with us. 

And could Palestrina, — the frigidum Prceneste of 
Horace, which had entertained over and over, the 
noblest of the Colonna, and the most noble Adrian — 
could Palestrina not furnish a dinner to a tired 
traveller ? 

" Si, Signore,'''' said the snub-looking priest. 
" Si, Signorino,'''' said the neat old lady ; and 
away we went upon a new search. And we found 
bright and happy faces ; — especially the little girl of 
twelve years, who came close by me as 1 ate, and 
afterward strung a garland of marigolds, and put it 
on my head. Then there was a bright-eyed boy of 
fourteen, who wrote his name, and those of the whole 
family, upon a fly leaf of my book : and a pretty, 



T H E M R N I N G. 211 

saucy-looking girl of sixteen, who peeped a long time 
from behind the kitchen door, but before the evening 
was gone, she was in the chair beside me, and had 
written her name — Carlotta — upon the first leaf of 
my journal. 

When I woke, the sun was up. From my bed I 
could see over the town, the thin, lazy mists lying 
on the old camp-ground of Pyi'rhus ; beyond it, were 
the mountains, which hide Frascati, and Monte Cavi. 
There was old Colonna too, that — 

Like an eagle's nest, hangs on the crest 
Of purple Appeniae. 

As the mist lifted, and the sun brightened the 
plain, I could see the road, along which Sylla came 
fuming and maddened after the Mithridaten war. I 
could see, as I half dreamed and half slept, the fright- 
ened peasantry whooping to their long-horned cattle, 
as they drove them on tumultuously up through the 
gateways of the town ; and women with babies iu 
their arms, and children scowling with fear and hate, 
— all trooping fast and madly, to escape the hand of 
the Avenger ; — alas ! ineffectually, for Sylla mur- 
dered them, and pulled down the walls of their town 
— the proud Palestrina ! 

I had a queer fancy of seeing the nobles of Rome, 



212 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

led OQ by Stefeno Colonna, grouping along the plain, 
their corslets flashing out of the mists, — their pen- 
nants dashing above it, — coming up fast, and still as 
the wind, to make the Mural Prceneste, their strong- 
hold against the Last of the Tribunes. And strangely 
mingling fiction with fact, I saw the brother of Wal- 
ter de Montreal, with his noisy and bristling army, 
crowd over the Campagna, and put up his white tents, 
and hang out his showy banners, on the grassy knolls 
that lay nearest my eye. 

But the knolls were all quiet ; there was not 

so much as a strolling contadino on them, to whistle 
a mimic fife-note. A little boy from the inn went 
with me upon the hill, to look out upon the town and 
the wide sea of land below ; and whether it was the 
soft, warm April sun, or the gray ruins below me, or 
whether the wonderful silence of the scene, or some 
wild gush of memory, I do not know, but something 
made me sad. 

" Perche cod penseroso ? — why so sad ?" said the 
quick-eyed boy. " The air is beautiful, the scene is 
beautiful ; Signore is young, why is he sad .^" 

" And is Giovanni never sad .?" said I. 

" Quasi mni^''^ said the boy, " and if I could travel 
as Signore, and see other countries, I would be al- 
ways gay." 

" May you be always that !" said I. 



The Mor nm ng. 213 

The good wish touched him ; ha took me by tho 
arms, and said — " Gro home with me, Signore ; you 
were happy at the inn last niglit ; go back, and we 
will make you gay again !" 

If we could be always boys ! 

I thanked him in a way that saddened him. We 
passed out shortly after from the city gates, and 
strode on over the rolling plain. Once or twice we 
turned back to look at the rocky heights beneath 
which lay the ruined town of Palostriua ; — a city that 
defied Rome, — that had a king before a ploughshare 
had touched the Capitolino, or the Janiculau hill ! 
The ivy was covering up richly the Etruscan founda- 
tions, and there was a quiet over the whole place. 
The bmoke was rising straight into the sky from the 
chimney tops ; a peasant or two, were going along 
the road with donkeys ; besidi this, the city was, to 
all appeai-ance, a dead city. And it seemed to me 
that an old monk, whom I could see with my glass, 
near the little chapel above the town, might be going 
to say mass for the soul of the dead city. 

And afterward, when we came near to Rome, and 
passed under the temple tomb of Metella, — my friend 
said, — " And will you go back now to your home ? 
or will you set off with me to-morrow for Ancona .'" 

" At least, I must say adieu," returned I. 

"God speed you!" said he, and we parted upon 



214 Reveries OF a Bachelor. 

the Piazza di Venezia, — he for his last mass at St. 
Peter's, and I for the tall house upon the Corso. 



E N R I c A . 

I HEAR her glancing feet, the moment I have tinkled 
the bell ; — and there she is, with her brown hair 
gathered into braids, and her eyes full of joy, and 
greeting. And as I walk with the mother to the 
window to look at some pageant that is passing, — she 
steals up behind, and passes her arm around me, with 
a quick electric motion, and a gentle pressure of 
welcome — that tells more than a thousand words. 

It is a pageant of death that is passing below. Far 
down the street, wo see heads thrust ou.t of the win- 
dows, and standing in bold relief against the red 
torch-light of the moving train. Below, dim figures 
are gathering on the narrow side ways to look at the 
solemn spectacle. A hoarse chant rises louder, and 
louder ; and half dies in the night air, and breaks out 
again with new, and deep bitterness. 

Now, the first torch-light under us shines plainly 
on faces in the windows, and on the kneeling women 
in the street. First, come old retainers of the dead 
one, bearing long blazing flambeaux. Then comes a 
eompan^^ of priests, two by two, bare-headed, and 



The Morning. 215 

every second one with a lighted torch, and all are 
chanting. 

Next, is a brotherhood of friars in brown cloaks, 
with sandalled feet ; — and the red-light streams full 
upon their grizzled heads. They add their heavy 
guttural voices to the chant, and pass slowly on. 

Then comes a company of priests, in white muslin 
capes, and black robes, and black caps, — bearing 
books in their hands, wide open, and lit up plainly 
by the torches of churchly servitors, who march be- 
side them ; and from the books, the priests chant 
loud and solemnly. Now, the music is loudest ; and 
the friars take up the dismal notes from the white- 
capped priests, and the priests before catch them from 
the brown-robed friars, and mournfully the sound rises 
up between the tall buildings, — into the blue night- 
sky, that lies between Heaven and Rome. 

— " Feie — vedeP^ — says Cesare ; and in a blaze of 
the red-torch fire, comes the bier, borne on the necks 
of stout friars ; and on the bier, is the body of a dead 
man, habited like a priest. Heavy plumes of black 
wave at each corner. 

— " Hist !" — says my landlady. 

The body is just under us. Enrica crosses herself ; 
her smile is for the moment gone, Cesare's boy-face 
is grown suddenly earnest We could see the pale, 
youthful features of the dead man. The glaring 



216 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

flambeaux, sent their flauDting streams of unearthly 
light over the wan visage of the sleeper. A thousand 
eyes were looking on him ; but his face careless of 
them all, was turned up, straight toward the stars. 

Still the chant rises ; and companies of priests fol- 
low the bier, like those who had gone before. Friars, 
in brown cloaks, and prelates, and Cirmelites come 
after — all with torches. Two by two — their voices 
growing hoarse — they tramp, and chant. 

For a while the voices cease, and you can hear the 
rustling of their robes, and their foot-falls, as if your 
ear was to the earth. Then the chant rises again, as 
they glide on in a wavy, shining line, and rolls back 
over the death-train, like tho howling of a wind in 
winter. 

As they pass, the faces vanish from the windows. 
The kneeling women upon the pavement, rise up, 
mindful of the paroxysm of Life once more. The 
groups in the door-ways scatter. But their low 
voices do not drown the voices of the host of mourn- 
ers, and their ghost-like music. 

1 look long upon the blazing bier, trailing undei 
the deep shadows of the Roman palaces, and at the 
stream of torches, winding like a glittering, scaled 

serpent. It is a priest — say I to my landlady, as 

she closes the window. 

" No, signor, — -a 3'oung man never married, and so 



The Morn in a. 217 

by virtue of bis condition, they put on biui the priest- 
robes." 

"• So I" — says the pretty Earica — " if I should 
die, would be robed in white, as you saw me on a 
carnival night, and be followed by nuns for sisters." 

" A long way off may it be, Enrica !" 

She took my hand in hers, and pressed it. An 
Italian girl does not fear to talk of death ; and we 
were talking of it still, as we walked back to my little 
parlor — my hand all the time in hers — and sat down 
by the blaze of my fire. 

It was holy week — never had Eurica looked more 
sweetly than in that black dress, — under that long, 
dark veil of the days of Lent. Upon the broad 
pavement of St. Peter's, — where the people flocking 
by thousands, made only side groups about the altars 
of the vast temple — I have watched her kneeling, 
beside her mother, — her eyes bent down, her lips 
moving earnestly, and her whole figure tremulous with 
deep emotion. Wandering around among the hal- 
berdiers of the Pope, and the court coats of Austria, 
and the bare-footed pilgrims with sandal, shell and 
staff, I would sidle back again, to look upon that 
kneeling figure ; and leaning against the huge 

columns of the church, would dream even as I 

am dreaming now. 

At night-fall, I urge my way into the Sistine 
1« 



218 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

Chapel : Enrica is beside me, — looking with me upon 
the gaunt figures of the Judgment of Angelo. They 
are chanting the Miserere. The twelve candle-sticks 
by the altar are put out one by one, as the service 
continues. The sun has gone down, and only the red 
glow of twilight steals through the dusky windows. 
There is a pause, and a brief reading from a red- 
cloaked cardinal, and all kneel down. »S/;e kneels 
beside me : and the sweet, mournful flow of the 
Miserere begins again, — growing in force, and depth, 
till the whole chapel rings, and the balcony of the 
choir trembles : then, it subsides again into the low 
soft wail of a single voice — so prolonged — so tremu- 
lous, and so real, that the heart aches, and the tears 

start for Christ is dead ! 

Lingering yet, the wail dies not wholly, but 

just as it seemed expiring, it is caught up by another 
and stronger voice that carries it on, plaintive as 
ever ; — nor does it stop with this — for just as you 
looked for silence, three voices more begin the 
lament — sweet, touching, mournful voices, — and bear 
it up to a full cry, when the whole choir catch its 
burden, and make the lament change into the wailings 
of a multitude — wild, shrill, hoarse — with swift chants 
intervening, as if agony had given force to anguish. 
Then, sweetly, slowl}^, voice by voice, note by note, 
the wailings sink into the low, tender, moan of a 



The Mo rn I n . . 219 

single singer — faltering, tremulous, as if te irs checked 
the utterance ; and swelling out, as if despair sustain- 
ed it. 

It was dark in the chapel, when we went out ; 

voices were low. Enrica said nothing 1 could 

say nothing. 

I was to leave Rome after Easter ; I did not 
love to speak of it — nor to think of it. Rome — that 
old city, with all its misery, and its fallen state, and 
its broken palaces of the Empire — grows upon one's 
heart. The fringing shrubs of the coliseum, flaunting 
their blossoms at the tall beggar-men in cloaks, who 
grub below, — the sun glimmering over the mossy pile 
of the House of Nero, — the sweet sunsets from the 
Pincian, that make the broad pine-tops of the Jani- 
culan, stand sharp and dark against a sky of gold, 
cannot easily be left behind. And Eurica with her 
silver brown hair, and the silken fillet that bound 
it, — and her deep blue eyes, — and her white, delicate 
fingers, — and the blue veins chasing over her fair 
temples ah, Blaster is too near ! 

But it comes ; and passes with the glory of St. 
Peter's — lighted from top to bottom. With Enrica — 
I saw it from the Ripetta, as it loomed up in the 
distance, like a city on fire. 

The next day, I bring home my last bunch of 
flowers, and with it a little richly-chased Roman ring, 



220 Reveries of a Bacielor. 

No fire blazes on the hearth — but th(.y are all there 
Warm days have come, and the summer air, even 
now, hangs heavy with fever, in the hollows of the 
plain. 

I heard them stirring early on the morning on 
which T was to go away. I do not think I slept very 
well myself — nor veiy late. Never did Enrica look 
more beautiful — never. All her Carnival robes, and 
the sad drapery of the Friday of Crucifixion could 
not so adorn her beauty as that neat morning dress, 
and that simple rosebud she wore upon her bosom. 
She gave it to me — the last — with a trembling hand. 
I did not, for I could not, thank her. She knew it; 
and her eyes were full. 

The old man kissed my cheek — it was the Roman 
custom, but the custom did not extend to the Roman 
girls ; — at least not often. As I passed down the 
Corso, I looked back at the balcony, where she stood 
in the time of Carnival, in the brown Sombrero, with 
the white plume. I knew she would be there now ; 
and there she was. My eyes dwelt upon the vision, 
very loth to leave it ; and after my eyes had lost it, 
my heart clung to it, — there, where my memory 
clings now. 

At noon, the carriage stopped upon the hills, to- 
ward Soracte, that overlooked Rome. There was a 
stunted pine tree grew a little way from the road, and 



The M r n I n q . 221 

I sat down under it, — for I wished no dinner — and 
I looked back with strange tumult of feeling, upon 
the sleeping eitj, with the gray, billowy sea of the 
Campagna, lying around it. 

I seemed ts see Enrica — the Roman girl, in that 
morning dress, v/ith her brown hair in its silken fillet ; 
— but the rose-bud that was in her bosom, was now 
in mine. Her silvery voice too, seemed to float past 
me, bearing snatches of Roman songs ; — but the songs 
were sad and broken. 

After all, this is sad vanity ! — thought I : and 

yet if I had espied then some returning carriage 
going down toward Rome, I will not say — but that I 
should have hailed it, and taken a place, — and gone 
back, and to this day, perhaps — have lived at Rome, 

But the vetturino called me ; the coach was ready ; 
— I gave one more look toward the dome that guarded 
the sleeping city ; and then, wc galloped down the 
mountain, on the road that lay towards Perugia, and 
Lake Thrasimene. 

Sweet Enrica ! art thou living yet ? Or hast- 

thou passed away to that Silent Land, where the 
good sleep, and the beautiful } 



The vision:: of the Past fade. The morning breeze 
has died upon the meadow ; the Bob-o'-Lincoln sita 
swaying on the willow tufts — singing uo longer. The 



222 Reveres OF a Bachelor. 

trees lean to the brook ; but the shadows fall straight 
and dense upon the silver stream. 

Noon has broken into the middle sky ; and Morn- 
ing is gone. 



II. 

Noon. 

THE Noon is short ; the sun never loiters on the 
meridian, nor does the shadow on the old dial 
by the garden, stay long at XII. The Present, like 
the noon, is only a point ; and a point so fine, that it 
is not measurable by the grossness of action. Thought 
alone is delicate enough to tell the breadth of the 
Present. 

The Past belongs to God : the Present only is 
ours. And short as it is, there is more in it, and of 
it, than we can well manage. That man who can 
grapple it, and measure it, and fill it with his purpose, 
is doing a man's work : none can do more : but there 
are thousands who do less. 

Short as it is, the T'rcscnt is great and strong ; — as 



224 Reveries of a BACiiELOR. 

much stronger than the Past, as fire than ashes, or as 
Death than the grave. The noon sun •will quicken 
vegetable life, that in the morning was dead. It ia 
hot and scorching : I feel it now upon my head : but 
it does not scorch and heat like the bewildering 
Present. There are no oak leaves to interrupt the 
rays of the burning now. Its shadows do not fall 
east or west ; — like the noon, the shade it makes, falls 
straight from sky to earth — straight from Heaven to 
Hell! 

Memory presides over the Past ; Action presides 
over the Present. The first lives in a rich temple 
bung with glorious trophies, and lined with tombs : 
the other has no shrine but Duty, and it walks the 
earth like a spirit ! 

1 called my dog to me, and we shared 

together the meal that I had brought away at sunrise 
from the mansion under the elms ; and now. Carlo is 
gnawing at the bone that I have thrown to him, and I 
stroll dreamily in the quiet noon atmosphere, upon 
that grassy knoll, under the oaks. 

Noon in the country is very still : the birds do not 
sing : the workmen are not in the field : the sheep lay 
their noses to the ground ; and the herds stand in 
pools, under shady trees, lashing their sides, — but 
otherwise, motionless. The mills upon the brook, far 
above, have ceased f\ r an hour their labor ; and the 



Noon. 225 

Btream softens its rustle, and sinks ^way from the 
sedgy banks. The heat plays upon the meadow iu 
noiseless waves, and the beech leaves do not stir. 

Thought, I said, was the only measure of the 
Present : and the stillness of noon breeds thought : 
and my thought brings up the old companions, and 
stations them in the domain of now. Thought 
ranges over the world, and brings up hopes, and fears, 
and resolves, to measure the burning now. Joy, and 
grief, and purpose, blending in my thought, give 
breadth to the Present. 

— ^Where — thought I — is little Isabel now : Where 
is Lilly — where is Ben r Where is Leslie, — where is 
my old teacher } Where is my chum, who played 
such rare tricks — where is the black-eyed Jane .? — 
Where is that sweet-faced girl whom I parted with 
upon that terrace, looking down upon the old spire of 
Modbury church } Y/here are my hopes — where 
my purposes- -where my sorrows } 

I care not who you are — but if you bring such 
thought to measure the Present, the present will 
seem broad ; and it will be sultry as noon — and make 
a fever of Now. 



10' 



226 Reveries >f a Bachelor. 



Early Friends. 

"Where are tbcy ? 

I cannot sit now, as once, upon the edge of tho 
brook, hour after hour, flinging off ray line and hook 
to the nibbling roach, and reckon it great sport. 
There is no girl with auburn ringlets to sit beside me, 
and to play upon the bank. The hours are shorter 
than they were then ; and the little joys that furnished 
boyhood till the heart was full, can fill it no longer. 
Poor Tray is dead, long ago ; and he cannot swim 
into the pools for the floating sticks ; nor can I sport 
with him hour after hour, and think it happiness. 
The niound that covers his grave is sunken ; and the 
trees that shaded it, are broken and mossy. 

Little Lilly is grown into a woman, and is married ; 
and she has another little Lilly, with flaxen hair, she 
says, — looking as s/ie used to look. I dare say the 
child is pretty; but it is not my Lilly. She has a 
little boy too, that she calls Paul ; — a chubby 
rogue — she writes, — and as mischievous as ever I 
was. God bless the boy ! 

Ben, — who would have liked a ride in the coach 
that carried me away to school — has had a great 
many rides since then — rough rides, and hard ones, 



Noon. 227 

over the road of life. He does not rake up tlie falling 
leaves for bonfires, as he did once ; he is grown a 
man, and is fighting his way somewhere in our 
western world, to the short-lived honours of time. He 
was married not long ago ; his wife I remembered as 
one of my playmates at my first school : she was 
beautiful, but fragile as a leaf. She died within a 
year of their marriage. Ben was but four years my 
senior ; but this grief has made him ten years older. 
He docs not say it ; but his eye and his figure tell it. 

The nurse who put the purse in my hand that dis- 
mal morning, is grown a feeble old woman. She was 
over fifty tlien ; she may well be seventy now. She 
did not know ray voice when I went to see her the 
other day, nor did she know my face at all. She 
repeated the name when I told it to her — Paul, 
Paul, — she did not remember any Paul, except a 
little boy, a long while ago. 

" To whom you gave a purse when he went 

away, and told him to say nothing to Lilly or to 
Ben .-" 

" Yes, that Paul" — says the old woman ex- 

ultingly — " do you know him .'" 

And when I told her — " she would not have believed 
it '." But she did ; and took hold of my hand again, 
(for she was blind); and then smoothed down the plaits 
of her apron, and jogged her cap strings, to look tidy in 



228 RE^■EnIEs of a Bachelor. 

the prescnco of ' the gentleman.' And she told me 
long stories about the old bouse and bow otber people 
came in afterward ; and she called me ' sir' sometimes, 
and sometimes ' Paul.' But I asked ber to say only 
Paul ; sbe seemed glad for tbis, and talked easier ; 
and went on to tell of my old playmates, and bow we 
used to ride the pony — poor Jacko ! — and bow we 
gathered nuts — such heaping piles ; and bow we used 
to play at fox and geese through the long winter 

evenings ; and bow my poor mother would smile 

but here I asked her to stop. She could not have 
gone on much longer, for I believe she loved our house 
and people, better than sbe loved ber own. 

As for my uncle, the cold, silent man, who lived 
with bis books in the house upon the bill, and who 
used to frighten me sometimes with bis look, he grew 
very feeble after I had left, and almost crazed. The 
country people said that be was mad ; and Isabel 
with her sweet heart clung to him, and would lead 
him out when his step tottered, to the seat in the 
garden, and read to him out of the books he loved to 
hear. And sometimes, they told me, she would read 
to him some letters that I had written to Lilly or to 
Ben, and ask him if he remembered Paul, who saved 
her from drowning under the tree in the meadow.-* 
But he could only shake bis bead, and mutter some- 
thing about bow old and feeble be had grown. 



Noon. 229 

They wrote- mc afterward that he died , and was 
buried in a far-away place, where his wife )nce lived, 
and where he now sleeps beside her. Isal al was sick 
with grief, and came to live for a time with Lilly ; 
but when they wrote me last, she had gone back to 
her old home — where Tray was buried, — where we 
had played together so often, through the long days 
of summer. 

I was glad I should find her there, when I came 
back. Lilly and Ben were both living nearer to the 
city, when I landed from my long journey over the 
seas ; but still I went to find Isabel first. Perhaps I 
had heard so much oftener from the others, that I felt 
less eager to see them ; or perhaps I wanted to save 
my best visits to the last ; or perhaps — (I did think 
it) perhaps I loved Isabel, better than them all. 

So I went into the country, thinking all the way, 
how she must have changed since 1 left. She must 
be now nineteen or twenty ; and then her grief must 
have saddened her face somewhat ; but I thought I 
should like her all the better for that. Then perhaps 
she would not laugh, and tease me, but would be 
quieter, and wear a sweet smile — ro calm, and beau 
tiful, I thought. Her figure too mus ; have grown 
more elegant, and she would have more dignity in her 
air. 

I shuddered a ]-*tlc at this; fo; I thought, — sha 



230 Reveries of a Bachelor 

will hardly think so much of rue then ; perhaps she 
will have seen those whom she likes a great deal bet- 
ter. Perhaps she will not like me at all ; yet I knew 
very well that I should like her. 

I had gone up almost to the house ; I had passed 
the stream where we fished on that day, many years 
before ; and I thought that now since she was grown 
to womanhood, I should never sit with her there 
again, and surely never drag her as I did out of the 
water, and never chafe her little hands, and never 
perhaps kiss her, as I did, when she sat upon my 
mother's lap — oh, no — no — no ! 

I saw where we buried Tray, but the old slab was 
gone ; there was no ribbon there now. I thought 
that at least, Isabel would have replaced the slab ; — 
but it was a wrong thought. I trembled when I went 
up to the door — for it flashed upon me, that perhaps, 
— Isabel was married. I could not tell why she 
should not ; but I knew it would make me uncom- 
fortable, to hear that she had. 

There was a tall woman who opened the door ; she 
did not know me ; but I recognized her as one of the 
old servants. I asked after the housekeeper first, 
thinking I would surprise Isabel. My heart fluttered 
somewhat, thinking that she might step in suddenly 
herself — or perhaps that she might have seen me 



Noon. 231 

coming up the bill. But even then, I thought, she 
would liardly know me. 

Presently the housekeeper came in, looking very 
grave ; she asked if the gentleman wished to see her .-' 

The gentleman did wish it, and she sat down on 
one side of the fire ; — for it was autumn, and the 
leaves were falling, and the November winds were 
very chilly. 

— Shall I tell her — thought I — who I am, or ask 
at once for Isabel ? I tried to ask ; but it was hard 
for me to call her name ; it was very strange, but I 
could not pronounce it at all. 

" Who, sir ?" — said the housekeeper, in a tone so 
earnest, that I rose at once, and crossed over, and 
took her hand: — "You know me," said I, — "you 
surely remember Paul?" 

She started with surprise, but recovered herself, 
and resumed the same grave manner. I thought I 
had committed some mistake, or been in some way 
cause of offence. I called her — Madame, and asked 
for — Isabel .' 

She turned pale, terribly pale — " Bella t" said she 

"Yes, Bella." 

" Sir— Bella is dead !" 

I dropped into my chair. I said nothing. The 
housekeeper — bless her kind heart ! — slipped noise- 
lessly out. INIy hands were over my eyes. The 



232 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

winds were sighing ontsiJe, and llie clock ticking 
mournfully within. 

I did not sob, nor weejD, nor utter any cry. 

The clock ticked mournfully, and the winds were 
sighing; but I did not hear them any longer ; there 
was a tempest raging within me, that would have 
drowned the voice of thunder. 

It broke at length in a long, deep sigh, — " oh God !" 
— said I. It may have been a prayer ; — it was not 
an imprecation. 

Bella — sweet Bella was dead ! It seemed as if 
with her, half the world were dead — every bright face 
darkened — every sunshine blotted out, — every flower 
withered, — every hope extinguished ! 

I walked out into the air, and stood under the trees 
where we had played together with poor Tray — where 
Tray lay buried. But it was not Tray I thought of, 
as I stood there, with the cold wind playing through 
my hair, and my eyes filling with tears. How could 
she die ? Why loas she gone ? Was it really true ,-* 
Was Isabel indeed dead — in her coffin — buried } 
Then why should anybody live ? What was there to 
live for, now that Bella was gone ? 

Ah, what a gap in the world, is made by the death 
of those we love ! It is no longer whole, but a poor 
half-world that swings uneasy on its- axis, and makes 
you dizzy with the clatter of its wreck ' 



Noon. 233 

The housekeeper told nic all — little by li ,tle, as I 
lound calmness to listen. She had been dead a 
month ; Lilly was with her through it all ; she died 
sweetly, without pain, and without fear, — what can 
angels fear ? She had spoken often of ' Cousin Paul ;' 
she had left a little pacquet for him, but it was not 
there ; she had given it into Lilly's keeping. 

Her grave, the housekeeper told me, was only a 
little way oif from her home — beside the grave of a bro- 
ther who died long years before. I went there that 
evening. The mound was high and fresh. The sods 
had not closed together, and the dry leaves caught in 
the crevices, and gave a ragged and a terrible look to 
the grave. The next day, I laid them all smooth — 
as we had once laid them on the grave of Tray ; — I 
clipped the long grass, and set a tuft of blue violets 
at the foot, and watered it all with — tears. The 
homestead, the trees, the fields, the meadows — in the 
windy November, looked dismally. I could not like 
them again ; — I liked nothing, but the little mound, 
that I had dressed over Bella's grave. There she 
sleeps now, — the sleep of Death ! 



School Revisited. 

The old school is there r-ti'.l, — with the high cupola 
upon it, and the long galleries, with the sleeping 



234 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

rooms opening out on eithei- side, and the corner cue, 
where I slept. But the boys are not there, nor the 
old teachers. They have ploughed up the play-ground 
to plant corn, and the apple tree with the low limb, 
that made our gymnasium, is cut down. 

I was there only a little time ago. It was on a 
Sunday. One of the old houses of the village had 
been fashioned into a tavern, and it was there I 
stopped But I strolled by the old one, and looked 
into the bar-room, where I used to gaze with wonder 
upon the enormous pictures of wild animals, which 
heralded some coming menagerie. There was just 
such a picture hanging still, and two or three adver- 
tisements of sheriffs, and a little bill of a ' horse stolen,' 
and — as I thought — the same brown pitcher on the 
edge of the bar, I was sure it was the same great 
wood box that stood by the fire place, and the same 
whip, and great coat hung in the corner. 

I was not in so gay costume, as I once thought 1 
would be wearing, when a man ; I had nothing better 
than a rusty shooting jacket; but even with this, I 
was determined to have a look about the church, and 
see if I could trace any of the faces of the old times. 
They had sadly altered the building ; they had 
cut out its long galleries, and its old fashioned square 
pews, and filled it with narrow boxes, as they do in 
the city. The pulpit was not so high, or grand ; and 



Noon. 235 

it was covered over with the work of the cabinet- 
makers. 

I missed too the old preacher, whom we all feared 
so much ; and in place of him, was a jaunty looking 
. man, whom I thought I would not be at all afraid to 
speak to, or if need be, to slap on the shoulder. 
And when I did meet him after church, I looked him 
in the eye as boldly as a lion — what a change was 
that, from the school days ! 

Here and there, I could detect about the church, 
•some old farmer, by the stoop in his shoulders, or by 
a particular twist in his nose ; and one or two young 
fellows, who used to storm into the gallery in my 
school days, in very gay jackets, dressed off with rib- 
bons, — which we thought was astonishing heroism, and 
admired accordingly, — were now settled away into 
fathers of families ; and looked as demure, and peacea- 
ble, at the head of their pews, with a white-headed 
boy or two between them, and their wives, as if they 
had been married all their days. 

There was a stout man too, with a slight limp 
in his gait, who used to work on harnesses, and strap 
our skates, and who I always thought would have 
made a capital Yulcan, — he stalked up the aisle past 
me, as if I had my skates strapped at his shop, only 
yesterday. 

The bald-pated shoemaker, who never kept his 



236 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

word, and who worked in the brick shop, and who 
had a son called Theodore, — which we all thought a 
very pretty name for a shoemaker's son — I could not 
find. I feared he might be dead. I hoped, if he 
was, that his broken promises about patching boots 
would not come up against him. 

The old factor of tamarinds and sugar crackers, 
who used to drive his covered waggon every Saturday 
evening into the play-ground, I observed, still holding 
his place in the village choir ; and singing — though 
with a tooth or two gone, — as serenely, and obstre 
porously as ever. 

I looked around the church, to find the black-eyed 
girl who always sat behind the choir, — the one I 
loved to look at so much. I knew she must be 
grown up ; but I could fix upon no face positively ; 
once, as a stout woman with a pair of boys, and who 
wore a big red shawl, turned half around, I thought I 
recognized her nose. If it was she, it had grown red 
though ; and I felt cured of my old fondness. As for 
the other, who wore the hat trimmed with fur — she 
was nowhere to be seen, among either maids, or ma- 
trons ; and when I asked the tavern-keeper, and de- 
scribed her, and her father, as they were in my 
school-days, he told me that she had married too, and 
lived some five miles from the village ; and said he, — 
"I guess she leads her husband a devil of a life !" 



Noon. 237 

I felt cured of her too ; but I pitied the husband. 

One of my old teachers was in the church ; I could 
have sworn to his face ; he was a precise man ; and 
now I thought he looked rather roughly at my old 
shootino; jacket. But I let him look, and scowled at 
him a little ; for I remembered that he had feruled 
me once. I thought it was not probable that he 
would ever do it again. 

There was a bustling little lawyer in the village, 
who lived in a large house, and who was the great 
man of that town and country, — he had scarce 
changed at all ; and he stepped into the church as 
briskly, and promptly, as he did ten years ago. But 
what struck me most, was the change in a couple of 
pretty, little, white-haired girls, that at the time I 
left, were of that uncertain age, when the mother 
lifts them on a Sunday, and pounces them down one 
after the other upon the seat of the pew ; — these were 
now grown into blooming young ladies. And they 
swept by me in the vestibule of the church, with a 
flutter of robes, and a grace of motion, that fairly 
made my heart twitter in my bosom. I know nothing 
that brings home upon a man so quick, the conscious- 
ness of increasing years, as to find the little prattling 
girls, that were almost babies in his boyhood — become 
dashing ladies ; — and to find those whom he used to 
look on patronizingly, and compassionately — thinking 



238 Kever es Of A Bachelor. 

they were pretty little girls — grown to such maturity, 
that the mere rustle of their silk dress will give him 
a twinge ; and their eyes, if he looks at them — make 
him unaccountably shy. 

After service I strolled up by the school build- 
ings ; I traced the names that we had cut upon 
the fence ; but the fence had grown brown with 
age, and was nearly rotted away. Upon the beech 
tree in the hollow behind the school, the carv- 
ings were all overgrown. It must have been vaca- 
tion, if indeed there was any school at all ; for I 
could see only one old woman about the premises, 
and she was hanging out a dishcloth, to dry in the 
sun. I passed on up the hill, beyond the buildings, 
where in the boy-days, we built stone forts with 
bastions and turrets ; but the farmers had put 
bastions, and turrets, into their cobble-stone walls. 
At the orchard fence, I stopped, and looked — from 
force, I believe, of old habit, — to see if any one were 
watching ; — and then leaped over, and found my way 
to the early apple tree ; but the fruit had gone by. 
It seemed very daring in me, even then, to walk so 
boldly in the forbidden ground. 

But the old head-master who foibade it, was dead; 
and Russol and Burgess, and I know not how many 
others, who in other times, were culprits with me, 
were dead too. Wh:n I passed back by the school, 



Noon. 239 

I lingered to look up at the windows of that corner 
room, where I had slept the sound, healthful sleep of 
boyhood, — and where too I had passed many — many 
wakeful hours, thinking of the absent Bella, and of 
my home. 

How small, seem now, the great griefs of 

boyhood ! Light floating clouds will obscure the sun 
that is but half risen ; but let him be up — mid 
heaven, and the cloud that then darkens the land, 
must be thick, and heavy indeed. 

The tears started from my eyes: — was not 

such a cloud over me now .'' 



Co 



L L E G E . 



School-mates slip out of sight and knowledge, 
and are forgotten; or if you meet them, they bear 
another character ; the boy is not there It is a new 
acquaintance that you make, with nothing of your 
fellow upon the benches, but the name. Though the 
eye and face cleave to your memory, and you meet 
them afterward, and think you have met a friend — 
the voice or the action will break the charm, and you 
find only — another man. 

But with your classmates, in that later school, 
where form and character were both nearer ripeness, 



240 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

and where knowledge labored for tog-tlio;-, bred the 
first manly sj'uipathies, — it is different. And as you 
meet them, or hear of them, the thought of their 
advance makes a measure of your own — it makes a 

measure of the now. 

* 

You judge of your happiness, by theirs, — of your 
progress, by theirs, and of your prospects, by theirs. 
If one is happy, you seek to trace out the way by 
which he has wrought his happiness ; you consider 
how it differs from your own ; and you think with 
sighs, how you might possibly have wrought the 
same ; but noio it has escaped. If another has won 
some honorable distinction, you fall to thinking, how 
the man — your old equal, as you thought, upon the 
college benches — has outrun you. It pricks to effort, 
and teaches the difference between now, and then. 
Life with all its duties, and hopes, gathers upon your 
Present, like a great weight, or like a storm ready to 
burst. It is met anew ; it pleads more strongly ; and 
action that has been neglected, rises before you — a 
giant of remorse. 

Stop not, loiter not, look not backward, if you 
would be among the foremost ! The great Now, so 
quick, so broad, so fleeting, is yours ; — in an hour it 
will belong to the Eternity of the Past. The temper 
of Life is to bo made good by big honest blows ; stop 
striking, and yo'.x will do nothing : strike feebly, and 



N N . 241 

you will do almost as llttb. Suceo!^ rides on every 
hour : grapple it, and you may win : but without a 
grapple, it will never go with you. Work is the 
weapon of honor, and wbo lacks the weapon, will 
never triumph. 

There were some seventy of us — all scattered now. 
I meet one here and there at wide distances apart ; 
and we talk together of old days, and of our present 
work and life, — and separate. Just so ships at sea, 
in murky weather, will shift their, course to come 
within hailing distance, and compare their longitude, 

and part. One I have met wandering in southern 

Italy, dreaming as I was dreaming — over the tomb 
of Virgil, by the dark grotto of Pausilippo. It seemed 
strange to talk of our old readings in Tacitus there 
upon classic ground ; but wo did ; and ran on to talk 
of our lives ; and sitting down upon the promontory 
of Baie, looking off upon that blue sea, as clear as the 
classics, we told each other our respective stories. 
And two nights after, upon the quay, in sight of 
Vesuvius, which shed a lurid glow upon the sky, that 
was reflected from the white walls of the Hotel da 
Russie, and from the broad lava pavements, we parted 
— he to wander among the isles of the iEgeau, and I 
to turn northward. 

Another time, as I was wandering among those 
mysterious figures that crowd the foyer of the French 
11 



242 IIeveriesof a Bachelor. 

opera upon a night of the Masked Ball, I saw a 
familiar face : I followed it with my eye, until I be- 
came convinced. He did not know ine until I named 
his old seat upon the bench of the Division Room, 

and the hard-faced Tutor Gr . Then we talked 

of the old rivalries, and Christmas jollities, and of this 
and that one, whom we had come upon in our wayward 
tracks ; while the black-robed grisettes stared through 
their velvet masks ; — nor did we tire of comparing 
the old memories, with the unearthly gaiety of the 
scene about us, until day-light broke. 

In a quiet mountain town of New England, I came 
not long since upon another : he was hale and hearty, 
and pushing his lawyer work with just the same 
nervous energy, with which he used to recite a theo 
rem of Euclid. He was father too of a couple of 
stout, curly-pated boys ; and his good woman, as he 
called her, appeared a sensible, honest, good-natured 
lady. I must say that I envied him his wife, much 
more than I had envied my companion of the opera — 
his Domino. 

I happened only a little while ago to drop into tho 
college chapel of a Sunday. There were the same 
hard oak benches below, and the lucky fellows who 
enjoyed a corner seat, were leaning back upon the 
rail, after the old fashion. The tutors were perched 
up in their side boxes, looking as prim, and serious, 



Noon. 243 

and important, as »vcr The same stout Doctor read 
the hymn in the same rhythmical way ; and he prayed 
the same prayer, for (I thought) the same old sort of 
sinners. As I shut my eyes to listen, it seemed as if 
the intermediate years liad all gone out ; and that I 
was on n:y own pew bench, and thinking out those 
little schemes for excuses, or for effort, which were to 
relieve me, or to advance me, in my college world. 

There was a pleasure, like the pleasure of dreaming 
about forgotten joys — in listening to the Doctor's 
sermon : he began in the same half embarrassed, half 
awkward way ; and fumbled at his Bible leaves, and 
the poor pinched cushion, as he did long before. But 
as he \\ent on with his rusty and polemic vigour, the 
poetry within him would now and then warm his soul 
into a burst of fervid eloquence, and his face would 
glow, and his hand tremble, and the cushion and the 
Bible leaves be all forgot, in the glow of his thoufifht, 
until with a half cough, and a pinch at the cushion, 
he fell back into his strong, but tread-mill argu- 
mentation. 

In the corner above, was the stately, white-hairea 
professor, wearing the old dignity of carriage, and a 
smile as bland, as if the years had all been playthings ; 
and had I seen him in his lecture-room, I daresay I 
should have found the same suavity of address, the 



244 Reveries of a Bachelo*. 

same marvellous currency of talk, and the same infi 
nite composure over the exploding retorts. 

Near him was the silver-haired old gentleman, — 
■with a very astute expression, — who used to have an 
odd hahit of tightening his cloak about his nether limbs. 
I could not see that his eye was any the less bright ; 
nor did he seem less eager to catch at the handle of 
some witticism, or bit of satire, — to the poor student's 
cost. I remembered my old awe of him, I must say, 
with something of a grudge ; but I had got fairly 
over it now. There are sharper griefs in life, than % 
professor's talk. 

Farther on, I saw the long-faced, dark-haired man 
who looked as if he were always near some explosive, 
electric battery, or upon an insulated stool. He was, 
1 believe, a man of fine feelings ; but he had a way of 
reducing all action to dry, hard, mathematical sys- 
tem, with very little poetry about it. I know there 
was not much poetry in his problems in physics, and 
still less in his half-yearly examinations. But T do 
not dread them now. 

Over opposite, I was glad to see still, the aged 
head of the kind, and generous old man, who in my 
day presided over the college ; and who carried with 
him the affections of each succeeding class, — added to 
their respect for his learning. This seems- a higher 
triumph to me now, than it seemed then. A otrong 



Noon. 245 

mind, or a cultivated miud may challeuge respect ; 
but there is needed a noble one, to win aiFection. 

A new man now filled his place in the president's 
seat ; but he was one whom I had known, and been 
proud to know. His fip;uie was bent, and thin — the 
very figure that an old Flemish master would have 
chosen, for a scholar. His eye had a kind of piercing 
lustre, as if it had long been fixed on books ; and his 
expression — when unrelieved by his affable smile — 
was that of hard midnight toil. With all his polish 
of mind, he was a gentleman at heart ; and treated us 
always with a manly courtesy, that is not forgotten. 

But of all the faces that used to be ranged below 
— four hundred men and boys — there was not one, 
with whom to join hands, and live back again. Their 
griefs, joys, and toil, were chaining them to their 
labor of life. Each one in his thought, coursing over 
a world as wide as my own ; — how many thousand 
worlds of thought, upon this one world of ours ; 

I stepped dreamily through the corridors of the old 
Atheneum, thinking of that first, fearful step, when 
the faces were new, and the stern tutor was strange, 
and the prolix Livy so hard. I wont up at night, and 
skulked around the buildings, when the lights were 
blazing from alj the windows, and they were busy 
with their tasks — plain tasks, and eas) tasks, — because 
they are certain tast.s. Happy fellows — thought I — 



246 Reveries of a E a c ii e l o r . 

wbo have only to do, what is set before you to be 
done. But the time is coming, and very" fast, when 
you must not only do, but know what to do. The 
time is coming, when in place of your one master, you 
will have a thousand masters — masters of duty, of 
business, of pleasure, and of grief — giving you harder 
lessons each one of them, than any of your Fluxions. 
Morning will pass, and the Noon will come — hot, 
and scorching. 



The Pacquet of Bella. 

1 HAVE not forgotten that pacquet of Bella ; I did 
not once forget it. And when I saw Lilly— now the 
grown up Lilly, happy in her household, and blithe 
as when she was a maiden, she gave it to me. She told 
me too of Bella^s illness, and of her suffering, and of 
her manner, when she put the little pacquet in her 
hand ' for Cousin Paul.' But this I will not repeat ; 
— I cannot. 

I know not why it was, but I shuddered at the 
mention of her name. There are some who will talk, 
at table, and in their gossip, of dead friends ; I won- 
der haw they do it .' For myself, when the grave has 
closed its gates on the faces of those I love — however 
busy my mournful thought may be, the tongue ih 



Noon. 24"' 

silent. I cannot name their names ; it shocks me to 
hear them named. It S3ems like tearing open half- 
healed wounds, and disturbing with harsh worldly 
noise, the sweet sleep of death. 

I loved Bella. I know not how I loved her, — 
whether as a lover, or as a husband loves a wife; I 
only know this, — I always loved her. She was so 
gentle — so beautiful, — so confiding, that I never once 
thought, but that the whole world loved her, as well 
as I. There was only one thing I never told to 

Bella ; 1 would tell her of all my grief, and of all 

my joys ; I would tell her my hopes, my ambitious 
dreams, my disappointments, my anger, and my dis- 
likes ; — but I never told her how much I loved her. 

I do not know why, unless I knew that it was need- 
less. But I should as soon have thought of telling 
Bella on some winter's day — Bella, it is winter ! — or 
of whispering to her on some balmy day of August — 
Bella, it is summer ! — as of telling her, after she had 
grown to girlhood. — Bella, I love you ! 

I had received one letter from her in the old coun- 
tries ; it was a sweet letter, in which she told me all 
that she had been doing, and how she had thought of 
me, when she rambled over the woods where we had 
rambled together. She had written two or three 
other letters, Lilly told me, but they had never 
reached me. I had told her too of all that made my 



248 Reveries of \ B.vCH::lor. 

happiness ; I wrote her about the sweet girl I had 
seen on shipboard, and how I met her afterward, and 
what a happy time we passed down in Devon. I 
even told her of the strange dream I had, in which 
Isabel seemed to be in England, and to turn away from 
me sadly, because I called her — Carry. 

I also told her of all I saw in that great world of 
Paris — writing, as I would write to a sister ; and I 
told her too of the sweet Roman girl, Enrica — of her 
brown hair, and of her rich eyes, and of her pretty 
Carnival dresses. And when I missed letter after 
letter, I told her that she must still write her 
letters, or some little journal, and read it to me when 
I came back. I thought how pleasant it would be to 
sit under the trees by her father's house, and listen 
to her tender voice going through that record of her 
thoughts, and fears. Alas, how our hopes betray 
us ! 

It began almost like a diary, about the time that 
her father fell sick. " It is" — said she to Lilly, when 
she gave it to her, " what I would have said to Cousin 
Paul, if he had been here." 

It begins " 1 have come back nov/ to father's 

house ; I could not leave him alone, for they told me 
he was sick. I found him not well ; he was very 
glad to see me, and kissed me so tenderly that I am sure. 



Noon. 249 

Cousin Paul, you would not have said, as you used to 
say — that he was a cold man ! I sometimes read to 
him, sitting iu the deep library window, (you remem- 
ber it,) where we used to nestle out of his sight, at 
dusk. He cannot read any more. 

" I would give anything to see the little Carry you 
speak of ; but do you know you did not describe her 
to me at all ; will you not tell me if she has dark 
hair, or light, or if her eyes are blue, or dark, like 
mine ^ Is she good ; did she not make ugly speeches, 
or grow peevish, in those long days upon the ocean } 
How I would have liked to have been with you, on 
those clear starlit nights, looking off upon the water ! 
But then I think that you would not have wished me 
there ; and that you did not once think of me even. 
This makes me sad ; yet I know not why it should ; 
for I always liked you best, when you were happy ; 
and I am sure you must have been happy then. You 
say you shall never see her after you have left the 
ship : — you must not think so, Cousin Paul ; if she is 
so beautiful, and fond, as you tell me, your own heart 
will lead you in her way, some time again ; I feel 
almost sure of it. 

* # * It j'ather is getting more and more 
feeble, and wandering in his mind ; this is very dreadful ; 
he calls nie sometimes by mj- mother's name ; and 

n* 



250 Revehies of a Bachelor. 

when I say — it is Isabel, — he says — what Isabel ' 
and treats me as if I was a stranger. The physician 
shakes his head when I ask him of father : oh, Paul, 
if he should die — what could I do .? I should die too — 
I know I should. Who would there be to care for me ? 
Lilly is married, and Ben is far off, and you Paul, whom 
I love better than either, are a long way from me. 
But God is good, and he will spare my father, 

* * * " So you have seen again your little 
Carry ! I told you it would be so. You tell me 
how accidental it was : — ah, Paul, Paul, you rogue, 
lionest as you are, I half doubt you there ! I like 
your description of her too : — dark eyes lilce mine you 
say — ' almost as pretty;' well, Paul, I will forgive you 
that ; it is only a white lie. You know they must be 
a great deal prettier than mine, or you would never 
have stayed a whole fortnight in an old farmer's 
house, far down in Devon ! I wish I could see her : 
I wish she was here with you now ; for it is mid- 
summer, and the trees and flowers were never prettier. 
But I am all alone ; father is too ill to go out at all. 
I fear now very much, that he will never go out 
again. Lilly was here yesterday, but he did not 
know her. She read me your last letter : it was not 
so long as mine. You are very — very good to me, 
Paul. 



Noon. 251 

* * * u Pqj. a long time I have written 
nothing : my father has been very ill, and the old 
housekeeper has been sick too, and father would have 
no one but me near him. He cannot live long. I 
feel sadly — miserably ; you will not know me when 
you come home ; your " pretty Bella" — as you used 
to call me, will have lost all her beauty. But perhaps 
you will not care for that, for you tell me you have 
found one prettier than ever. I do not know, Cousin 
Paul, but it is because I am so sad, and selfish — for 
sorrow is selfish — but T lo not like your raptures 
about the Roman girl. Be careful, Paul : I know 
your heart : it is quick and sensitive ; and I dare say 
she is pretty, and has beautiful eyes ; for they tell mo 
all the Italian girls have soft eyes. 

" But Italy is far away, Paul ; I can never see 
Enrica ; she will never come here. No — no, remem- 
ber Devon : I feel as if Carry was a sister now : I 
cannot feel so of the Roman girl : I do not want to 
feel so. You will say this is harsh ; and I am afraid 
you will not like me so well for it ; but I cannot help 
saying it. I love you too well. Cousin Paul, not to 
say it. 

* * * " It is all over ! Indeed, Paul, I 
am very desolate ! ' The golden bowl is broken' — - 
my poor father has gone tc his last home. I wag 



252 II E V E R I ; s r a B a c h !■: lor. 

espccting it; but how cau we expect that fearful 
comer — death ? He had been for a hmg time so 
feeble, that he could scarce speak at all : he sat for 
Lours iu his chair, looking upon the fire, or looking 
out at the window. lie would hardly notice me when 
T came to change his pillows, or to smooth them for 
his head. But before he died, he knew me as well as 
ever. ' Isabel,' he said, ' you have been a good 
daughter : God will reward you!' and he kissed me 
so tenderly, and looked after me so anxiously, with 
such intelligence in his look, that I thought perhaps 
he would revive again. In the evening he asked me 
for one of his books, that he loved very much. 
' Father,' said I, ' you cannot read ; it is almost 
dark.' 

" ' Oh, yes,' said he ; ' Isabel, I cau read now.' 
And I brought it ; he kept my hand a long while ; 
then he opened the book ; — it was a book about 
death. 

" I brought a candle, for I knew he could not read 
without. 

" ' Isabel, dear,' said he, ' put the candle a little 
nearer.' But it was close beside him even then. 

" ' A little nearer, Isabel,' — repeated he, and his 
voice was very faint ; and he grasped my hand hard, 

" ' Nearer, Isabel ! nearer !' 

*' There wa> no need to do it, for my poor father was 



Noon. 253 

dead ! Oh ! Paul, Paul ! — pity me. I do not know 
but I am crazed. It does not seem the same world 
it was. And the house, and the trees, oh, they are 
very dismal ! 

" I wish you would come home. Cousin Paul : life 
would not be so very — very blank as it is now. 
Lilly is kind ; — I thank her from my heart. But it 
is not her father who is dead ! 

* * * c< J g^YCi calmer now ; I am staying 
with Lilly. The world seems smaller than it did ; 
but Heaven seems a great deal larger : there is a 
place for us all there, Paul, — if we only seek it i 
They tell me you are coming home : I am glad. 
You will not like perhaps to come away from that 
pretty Enriea, you speak of; but do so, Paul. It 
seems to me that I see clearer than I did, and I talk 
bolder. The girlish Isabel you will not find, for I 
am much older, and my air is more grave ; and this 
sufferings ha.3 made me feeble — very feeble. 

* ■* * " It is not easy for me to write ; but 
I must tell you that I have just found out who your 
Carry is. Years ago, when you were away from home, 
I was at school with her. We were always together. 
I wonder I could not have found her out from your 
description ; but I did not even suspect it She is a 



254 Reveries of v Bachelor. 

dear girl, and is worthy of all your love. I have seen 
her once since you have met her: we talked of you. 
She spoke kindly — very kindly : more than this, I 
cannot tell you, for I do not know more. Ah, Paul, 
may you be haj)py : I feel as if I had but a little while 
to live. 

* * * " It is even so, my dear Cousin 
Paul,-^I shall write but little more ; my hand trem- 
bles now. But I am ready. It is a glorious world 
beyond this — I know it is ! And there we shall 
meet. I did hope to see you once again, and to hear 
your voice, speaking to me as you used to speak. 
But I shall not. Life is too frail with me. I seem 
to live wholly now in the world where I am going : — 
ihtre. is my mother, and my father, and my little 
brother — we shall meet — I know we shall meet ! 

* * * " fiie ]agt — Paul. Never again in 
this world ! I am happy — very happy. You will 
come to me. I can write no more. May good angels 
guard you, and bring you to Heaven !" 

Shall I go on } 

But the toils of life are upon me. Private griefs 
do not break the force, and the weight of the great — 
Present A life — at best the half of it, is before me. 



Noon. 255 

It is to be wrought out with nerve and work. And — 
blessed be God ! — there are gleams of sunlight upon 
it. That sweet Carry, doubly dear to me now, 
that she is joined with my sorrow for the lost Isabel, 

shall be sought for ! 

And with her sweet image floating before me, the 
Noon wanes, and the shadows of Evening lengthen 
upon the land. 



III. 

Evening. 

THE Future is a great land : — how the lights, 
and the shadows throng over it, — bright and 
dark, slow and swift ! 

Pride and Ambition build up groat castles on its 
plains, — great monuments on the mountains, that 
reach heavenward, and dip their tops in the blue of 
Eternity ! Then comes an earthquake — the earth- 
quake of disappointment, of distrust, or of inaction, 
and lays them low. Gaping desolation widens its 
breaches everywhere; the eye is full of them, and 
can see nothing beside. By and by, the sun peeps 
forth, — as now from behind yonder cloud — and rean- 
imates the soul. 

Fame beckons, sitting high iu the heavens ; and 



Evening. 257 

joy lends a lialo to the vision. A thousand resolves 
stir your heart ; your hand is hot, and feverish for 
action ; your brain works madly, and you snatch 
here, and you snatch there, in the convulsive throes 
of your delirium. Perhaps you see some earnest, 
careful plodder, once far behind you, now toiling 
slowly but surely, over the plain of life, until he seems 
near to grasping those brilliant phantoms which dance 
along the horizon of the future ; and the sight stirs 
your soul to frenzy, and you bound on after him with 
the madness of a fever in your veins. But it was by 
no such action, that the fortunate toiler has won his 
progress. His hand is steady, his brain is cool ; his 
eye is fixed, and sure. 

The Future is a great land ; a man cannot go round 
it in a day ; he cannot measure it with a bound ; he 
cannot bind its harvests into a single sheaf. It is 
wider than the vision, and has no end. 

Yet always, day by day, hour by hour, second by 
second, the hard Present is elbowing us off into that 
great land of the Future. Our souls indeed, wander 
to it, as to a home-land ; they run beyond time and 
space, beyond planets and suns, beyond far-off suns 
and comets, until like blind flies, they are lost in the 
blaze of immensity, and can only grope their way 
back to our earth and our time, by the cunning of 
instinct. 



25S Reveries of a Bachelor. 

Cut out the Future — even that little Future, which 
is the Evening of our life, and what a fall into 
vacuity ! Forbid those earnest forays over the bor- 
ders of Now, and on what spoils would the soul live ? 

For myself, I delight to wander there, and to 
weave every day, tlie passing life, into the coming 
life, — so closely, that I may be unconscious of the 
joining. And if so be that I am able, I would make 
the whole piece bear fair proportions, and just figures, 
— like those tapestries, on which nuns work by inches, 
and finish with their lives ; — or like those grand fres- 
cos, which poet artists have wrought on the vaults of 
old cathedrals, gaunt, and colossal, — appearing mere 
daubs of carmine and azure, a* they lay upon their 
backs, working out a hand's breadth at a time, — but 
when complete, showing — symmetrical, and glorious! 

But not alone does the soul wander to those glit- 
tering heights where fame sits, with plumes waving in 
zephyrs of applause ; there belong to it, other ap- 
petites, which range wide, and constantly over th<» 
broad Future-land. We are not merely, working, in 
telleotual machines, but social puzzles, whose solution, 
is the work of a life. Much as hope may Jean toward 
the intoxicating joy of distinction, there is another 
leaning in the soul, deeper, and stronger, toward those 
pleasures which the heart pants for, and in whose 
atmosphere, the affections bloom and ripen. 



Evening. 259 

The first may indeed be uppermost ; it may ba 
noisiest ; it may drown with the clamor of mid-day, 
the nicer sympathies. But all our day is not mid- 
day ; and all our life is not noise. Silence is as strong 
as the soul ; and there is no tempest so wild with 
blasts, but has a wilder lull. There lies in the depth 
of every man's soul a mine of affection, which from 
time to time will burn with the seething heat of a 
volcano, and heave up lava-like monuments, through 
all the cold strata of his commoner nature. 

One may hide his warmer feelings ; — he may paint 
them dimly ; — ho may crowd them out of his sailing 
chart, wh;M e he only sets down the harboi's for traffic ; 
yet in his secret heart, he will map out upon the 
great country of the Future, fairy islands of love, and 
of joy. There, he will be sure to wander, M'hon his 
soul is lost in those quiet and hallowed hopes, which 
take hold on Heaven. 

Love only, unlocks the door upon that Futurity, 
where the isles of the blessed, lie like stars. Affec- 
tion is the stepping stone to God. The heart is our 
onl}^ measure of infinitude. The mind tires wiih 
greatness; the heart — never. Thought is worried 
and weakened in its flight through the immensity of 
space ; but Love soars around the throne of thf 
Highest, with added blessing and strength. 

I know not how it mav be with others, but with 



260 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

me, the heart is a readier, and quicker builder of 
those fabrics which strew the great country of the 
Future, than the mind. They may not indeed rise 
so high, as the dizzy pinnacles that ambition loves to 
rear ; but they lie like fragrant islands, in a sea, 
whose ripple is a continuous melody. 

And as I muse now, looking toward the Evening, 
which is already begun, — tossed as I am, with the 
toils of the Past, and bewildered with the vexations 
of the Present, my affectionsL' are the architect, that 
build up the future refuge. And, in fancy at least, I 
will build it boldly; — saddened it may be, by the 
chance shadows of evening ; but through all, I will 
hope for a sunset, when the day ends, glorious with 
crimson, and gold. 



Carry. 

I SAID that harsh, and hot as was the Present, 
there were joyous gleams of light playing over the 
Future. How else could it be, when that fair being 
whom I met first upon the wastes of ocean, and whose 
name even, is hallowed by the dying words of Isabel, 
is living in the same world with me ? Amid all the 
perplexities that haunt me, as I wander from the 
present to the future, the thought of her image, of 



Evening. 261 

her smile, of lier last kind adieu, throws i dash of 
sunlight upon my path. 

And yet why .'' Is it not very idle ? Years have 
passed since J have seen her : I do not even know 
where she may ce. V/hat is she to me ? 

My heart whispers — very much ! — but I do not 
listen to that in my prouder moods. She is a woman, 
a beautiful woman indeed, whom I have known once — 
pleasantly known : she is living, but she will die, or 
she will marry ; — I shall hear of it by and by, and 
sigh perhaps — nothing more. Life is earnest around 
me ; there is no time to delve in the past, for bright 
things to shed radiance on the future. 

I will forget the sweet girl, who was with me upon 
the ocean, and think she is dead. This manly soul is 
strong, if wo Avould but think so : it can make a 
puppet of griefs, and take down, and set up at will, 
the symbols of its hope. 

— But no, I cannot : the more I think thus, the 
less, I really think thus. A single smile of that frail 
girl, when I recal it, — mocks all my proud purposes ; 
as if, without her, my purposes were nothing. 

Pshaw ! — I say — it is idle ! — and I bury my 

thought in books, and in long hours of toil ; but as the 
hours lengthen, and my head sinks with fatigue, and 
the shadows of ereniug play around me, there cornea 
again that sweet vision, Kiying with tender mockery — 



262 Reveries of a Bachel:.-i. 

is it idle ? And I am helpless, and am led away 
hopefully and joyfully, toward the golden gates whicb 
open on the Future. 

But this is only in those silent hours when the man 
is alone, and away from his working thoughts. At 
mid-day, or in the rush of the world, he puts hard 
armor on, that reflects all tho light of such joyous 
fancies. He is cold and careless, and ready for 
suffering, and for fight. 

One day I am traA-elling : I am absorbed in some 
present cares — thinking out some plan which is to 
make easier, or more successful, the voyage of life. 
I glance upon the passing scenery, and upon new 
faces, with that careless indifference whicli grows upon 
a man with years, and above all, with travel. There 
is no wife to enlist your sympathies — ko children to 
sport with : my friends are few, and scattered ; and 
are working out fairly, what is before them to do. 
Lilly is living here, and Ben is living there : their 
letters are cheerful, contented letters ; and they wish 
me well. Griefs even have grown light with wearing ; 
and I am just in that careless humor — as if I said, — 
jog on, old world — ^jog on ! And the end will come 
along soon ; and we shall get — poor devils that wo 
are — just what we deserve ! 

But ou a sudden, my eyes rest on a figure that I 
think I know. N'^w, the indifference flies like mist; 



Eve n I n g . 263 

and my heart throbs : and the old visions come up. 
I watch her, as if there were nothing else to be seen. 
The form is hers ; the grace is hers ; the simple dress 
— so neat, so tasteful, — that is hers too. She half 
turns her head : — it is the face that I saw under the 
velvet cap, in the Park of Devon ! 

I do not rush forward : I sit as if I were in a 
trance. I watch her every action — the kind atten- 
tions to her mother who sits beside her, — her naive 
exclamations, as we pass some point of surpassing 
beauty. It seems as if a new world were opening 
to me ; yet I cannot tell why. I keep my place, and 
think, and gaze. I tear the paper I hold ia my 
hand into shreds. I play with my watch chain, and 
twist the seal, until it is near breaking. I take out 
my watch, look at it, and put it back — yet 1 cannot 
tell the hour. 

It is she — I murmur — I know it is Carry ! 

But when they rise to leave, my lethargy is broken ; 
yet it is with a trembling hesitation — a faltering as it 
were, between the present life and the future, that I 
approach. She knows me on the instant, and greets 
me kindly ; — as Bella wrote — very kindly. Yet she 
shows a slight embarrassment, a sweet embarrassment. 
that I treasure in my heart, more closely even than 
the greeting. I change my course, aud tnv •! uitli 
them ; — now we talk of the old scenes, and 



264 Reveries OF a Bachelor 

seem to have made with me the difference of bs,lf a 
life time. 

It is five years since I parted with her, never 
hoping to meet again. She was then a frail ghl ; she 
is now just rounding into womanhood. Her eyes are 
as daik and deep as ever : the lashes that fringe them, 
seem to me even longer than they were. Her colour 
is as rich, her forehead as fair, her smile as sweet, as 
they were before ; — only a little tinge of sadness 
floats vipon her eye, like the haze upon a summer 
landscape. I grow bold to look upon her, and timid 
with looking. We talk of Bella : — she speaks in a 
soft, low voice, and the shade of sadness on her face, 
gathers — as when a summer mist obscures the sun. 
I talk in monosyllables : I can command no other. 
And there is a look of sympathy in her eye, when I 
speak thus, that binds my soul to her, as no smiles 
could do. What can draw the heart into the fulness 
of love, so quick as sympathy ? 

But this passes ; — we must part ; she for her home, 
and I for that broad home, that has been mine so 
long — the world. It seems broader to me than ever, 
and colder than ever, and less to be wished for than 
ever. A new book of hope is sprung wide open in 
my life : a hope of home ! 

We are to meet at some time, not far oflP, in the 
oitv wh«rc I am living I look lorward to that time, 



Evening. 265 

as at school I used to look for vacation : it is a povri 
(Vappiii for hope, for thought, and for countless 
journeyings into the opening future. Never did I 
keep the dates better, never count the days more 
carefully, whether for bonds to be paid, or for divi- 
dends to fall due. 

I welcome the time, and it passes like a dream. 
I am. near her, often as I dare ; the hours are vei-y 
short with her, and very long away. She receives 
me kindly — always very kindly ; she could not be 
otherwise than kind. But is it anything more .' 
This is a greedy nature of ours ; and when sweet 
kindness flows upon us, we want more. I know she 
is kind ; and yet in place of being grateful, I am only 
covetous of an CKcess of kindness. 

She does not mistake my feelings, surely : — ah, no, — 
trust a woman for that ! But v,'hat have I, or what 
am I, to ask a return .' She is pure, and gentle as an 
angel ; and I — alas — only a poor soldier in our world- 
fight against the Devil ! Sometimes in moods of 
vanity, I call up what I fondly reckon my excellen- 
cies or deserts — a sorry, pitiful array, that makes mo 
shame-faced when I meet her. And in an instant, I 
banish them all. And 1 think, that if 1 were called 
upon in some high court of justice, to say why I 
should claim her indulgence, or her love — I would 
say nothing of my sturdy eifort to beat down the 
12 



266 Reveries of v Bachelor^. 

roughnesses of toil — nothing of such manliness as wears 
a calm front amid the frowns of the world, — nothing 
of little triumphs, in the every-day fight of life ; but 
only, I would enter the simple plea — this heart is 
hers ! 

She leaves ; and I have said nothing of what was 
seething within me ; — how I curse my folly ! She is 
gone, and never perhaps will return. I recal in de- 
spair her last kind glance. The world seems blank 
to me. She does not know ; perhaps she does not 
care, if I love her. — Well, I will bear it, — I say. But 
I cannot bear it. Business is broken ; books are 
blurred ; something remains undone, that fate de- 
clares must be done. Not a place can I find, but 
her sweet smile gives to it, either a tinge of gladness, 
or a black shade of desolation. 

I sit down at my table with pleasant books ; the 
fire is burning cheerfully ; my dog looks up earnestly 
when I speak to him ; but it will never do ! Her 
ima^e sweeps away all these comforts in a flood. I 
fling down my book ; I turn my back upon my dog ; 
the fire hisses and spaikles in mockery of me. 

Suddenly a thought flashes on my brain ; — I will 
write to her — I say. And a smile floats over my 
face, — a smile of hope, ending in doubt. I catch up 
my pen — my trusty pen ; and the clean sheet lies be- 
fore me. The paper could not be better, nor the 



Evening. 267 

pea. I have writ: en hundreds of letters ; it is easy 
to write letters. But now, it is not easy. 

I begin, and cross it out. I begin again, and get 
on a little farther ; — then cross it out. I try again, 
but can write nothing. 1 fling down my pen in de- 
spair, and burn the sheet, and go to my librai-y for 
some old sour treatise of Shaftesbury, or Lyttleton ; 
and say — talking to myself all the while ; — let her 
go ! — She is beautiful, but I am strong ; the world is 
short ; we — I and my dog, and my books, and my 
pen, will battle it through bravely, and leave enough 
for a tomb-stone. 

But even as I say it, the teai-s start ; — it is all false 
saying ! And I throw Shaftesbury across the room, 
and take up my pen again. It glides on and on, as 
my hope glows, and I tell her of our first meeting, 
and of our hours in the ocean twilight, and of our un- 
steady stepping ou the heaving deck, and of that 
parting in the noise of London, and of my joy at 
seeing her in the pleasant country, and of my grief af- 
terward. And then I mention Bella, — her friend and 
mine — and the tears flow ; and then I speak of our 
last meeting, and of my doubts, and of this very eve- 
ning, — and how I could not write, and abandoned it, — 
and then felt something within me that made me write, 
and tell her all ! " That my heart v/as nofc 



268 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

my own, but was wholly heis ; — and that if she would 
be mine, T would cherish her, and love her always !" 

Then, I feel a kind of happiness, — a strange, tu- 
multuous happiness, into which doubt is creeping from 
time to time, bringing with it a cold shudder. I seal 
the letter, and carry it — a great weight — for the mail. 
It seems as if there could be no other letter that day • 
and as if all the coaches and horses, and cars, and 
boats were specially detailed to bear that single sheet. 
It is a great letter for me ; my destiny lies in it. 

I do not sleep well that night ; — it is a tossing 
sleep ; one time joy — sweet and holy joy comes to my 
dreams, and an angel is by me ; — another time, the 
angel fades, — the brightness fades, and I wake, strug- 
gling with fear. For many nights it is so, until the 
day comes, on which I am looking for a reply. 

The postman has little suspicion that the letter 
which he gives me — although it contains no promis 
sory notes, nor moneys, nor deeds, nor articles of 
trade — is yet to have a greater influence upon my life 
and upon my future, than all the letters he has ever 
brought to me before. But I do not show him this ; 
nor do I let him see the clutch with which I grasp 
it. I bear it, as if it were a great and fearful burden, 
to my room. I lock the door, and having broken the 
seal with a quivering hand, — read : — 



Evening. 269 



The Letter. 



"Paul — for I think I may call you so aow — I 
know not liow to answer you. Your letter gave mo 
great joy ; but it gave me pain too. I cannot — wili 
not doubt what you say ; I believe that you love me 
better than I deserve to be loved ; and I know that I 
am not worthy of all your kind praises. But it is not 
this that pains me ; for I know that you have a gen- 
erous heart, and would forgive, as you alwaj^s have for- 
given, any weakness of miue. I am proud too, very 
proud, to have won your love ; but it pains me — more 
perhaps than you will believe — to think that I cannot 
write back to you, as I would wish to write ; — alas^ 
never !" 

Here I dash the letter upon the floor, and with my 
hand upon my forehead, sit gazing upon the glowing 
coals, and breathing quick and loud. — The dream 
then is broken ! 

Presently 1 read again ; 

" You know that my father died, before we 



had ever met. He had an old friend, who had come 
from England ; and who in early life had done him 



270 Reveriks of a Bachelor. 

some great service, whicli made him seem like a 
brother. This old gentleman was my god-father, and 
called me daughter. When my f;ither died, he drew 
me to his side, and said, — ' Carry, I shall leave you, 
but my old friend will be your father ;' and he put my 
hand in his, and said — ' I give you my daughter.' 

" This old gentleman had a son, older than myself; 
but we were much together, and grew up as brother 
and sister. I was proud of him ; for he was tall and 
strong, and every one called him handsome. He was 
as kind too, as a brother could be ; and his father was 
like my ov/n father. Every one said, and believed, 
that we would one day be married ; and my mother, 
and my new father spoke of it openly. So did Lau- 
rence — for that is my friend's name. 

" I do not need to tell 3'ou any more, Paul ; for 
when I was still a girl, we had promised, that we 
would one day be man and wife. Laurence has been 
much in England ; and I believe he is there now. 
The old gentleman treats me still as a daughter, and 
talks of the time, when I shall come and live with 
him. The letters of Laurence are very kind ; and 
though he does not talk so much of our marriage as 
he did, it is only I think, because he regards it as so 
certain. 

" 1 have wished to tell you all this betore ; but I 



Evening. 271 

have feared to tell you ; I am afraid I have been too 
selfish to tell you. And now what can I say .' Lau- 
rence seems most to me like a brother ; — and you, 

Paul but I must not go on. For if I marry 

xjaurence, as fate seems to have decided, I will try 
and love hira, better than all the world. 

" But will you not be a brother, and love me, as 
you once loved Bella ; — you say my eyes are like 
hers, and that my forehead is like hers ; — will you not 
believe that my heart is like hers too ? 

" Paul,- if you shed tears over this letter — I have 
shed them as well as you. I can write no more now. ' 

" Adieu." 

I sit long looking upon the blaze ; and when I 
rouse myself, it is to say wicked things against destiny. 
Again, all the future seems very blank. I cannot 
love Carry, as I loved Bella ; she cannot be a sister 
to me ; she must be more, or nothing ! Again, I 
seem to float singly on the tide of life, and see all 
around me in cheerful groups. Everywhere the sun 
shines, except upon my own cold forehead. There 
seems no mercy in Heaven, and no goodness for me 
upon Earth. 

I write after some days, an answer to the letter. 
But it is a bitter answer, in which I forget myself, in 



272 Reveries of a Bachelcr. 

the whirl of my misfortunes — to the utterance of 
reproaches. 

Her reply, which comes speedily, is sweet, and 
gentle. She is hurt by my reproaches, deeply hurt. 
But with a touching kindness, of which I am not 
worthy, she credits all my petulance to my wounded 
feeling ; she soothes me ; but in soothing, only 
wounds the more. I try to believe her, when she 
speaks of her unworthiness ; — but I cannot. 

Business, and the pursuits of ambition or of in- 
terest, pass on like dull, grating machinery. Tasks 
are met, and performed with strength indeed, but 
with no cheer. Courage is high, as I meet the shocks, 
and trials of the world ; but it is a brute, careless 
courage, that glories in opposition. I laugh at any 
dangers, or any insidious pitfalls ; — what are they to 
me } "What do I possess, which it will be hard to 
lose ? My dog keeps by me ; my toils are present ; 

my food is ready ; my limbs are strong ; what 

need for more ? 

The months slip by ; and the cloud that floated 
over my evening sun, passes. 

Laurence wandering abroad, and writing to Caro- 
line, as to a sister, — writes more than his father could 
have wished. He has met new faces, very sweet 
faces ; and one which shows through the ink of his 
later letters, very gorgeously. The old gentleman 



Evening. 273 

does not like to lose thus his little Carry ; and lie 
writes back rebuke. But Laurence, with tlie letters 
of Caroline before him for data, throws himself upon 
his sister's kindness, and charity. It astonishes not 
a little the old gentleman, to find his daughter plead- 
ing in such strange way, for the son. " And what 
will you do then, my Carry .^" — the old man says. 

" Wear weeds, if you wish, sir ; and love you 

and Laurence more than ever !" 

And he takes her to his bosom, and says — " Carry 
— Carry, you are too good for that wild fellow Lau- 
rence !" 

Now, the letters are different ! Now they are full 
of hope — dawning all over the future sky. Business, 
and care, and toil, glide, as if a spirit animated them 
all ; it is no longer cold machine work, but intelligent, 
and hopeful activity. The sky hangs upon you 
lovingly, and the birds make music, that startles you 
with its fineness. Men wear cheerful feces; the 
storms have a kind pity, gleaming through all their 
wrath. 

The days approach, when you can call her yours. 
For she has said it, and her mother has said it ; and 
the kind old gentleman, who says he will still be her 
father, has said it too ; and they have all welcomed 
you — won by her story — with a cordiality, that has 
made yom* cup full, to running over. Only one 
12* 



274 Heveriesof a Bachelor. 

thought comes up tj obscure your joy ; — is it real ? 
or if real, are you worthy to enjoy ? Will you cher- 
ish and love always, as you have promised, that angel 
who accepts your word, and rests her happiness on 
your faith ? Are there not harsh qualities in your 
nature, which you fear may sometime make her re- 
gret that she gave herself to your love and charity ? 
And those friends who watch over her, as the apple 
of their eye, can you always meet their tenderness and 
approval, for your guardianship of their treasure ? Is 
it not a treasure that makes you fearful, as well aa 
joyful ? 

But you forget this in her smile : her kindness, her 
goodness, her modesty, will not let you remember it. 
She forbids such thoughts ; and you yield such obe- 
dience, as you never yielded even to the commands 
of a mother. And if your business, and your labor slip 
by, partially neglected — what matters it } What is 
interest, or what is reputation, compared with that 
fullness of your heart, which is now ripe with joy ? 

The day for your marriage comes ; and you live as 
if you were in a dream. You think well, and hope 
well for all the world. A flood of charity seems to 
radiate from all around you. And as you sit beside 
her in the twilight, on the evening before the day, 
when you will call her yours, and talk of the coming 
hopes, and of the soft shadows of the past ; and whis- 



Evening. 275 

per of Bella's love, and of that sweet sister's death, and 
of Laurence, a new brother, coming home joyful with 
his bride, — and lay your cheek to hers — life seems as 
if it were all da}', and as if there could be no night ! 

The marriage passes ; and she is yours, — yours 
'brever. 



New Travel. 

Again I am upon the sea ; but not alone. She 
whom I first met upon the wastes of ocean, is there 
beside me. Again I steady her tottering stop upon 
the deck ; once it was a drifting, careless pleasure ; 
now the pleasure is holy. 

Once the fear I felt, as the storms gathered, and 
night came, and the ship tossed madly, and great 
waves gathering swift, and high, came down like slip- 
ping mountains, and spent their force upon the quiv- 
ering vessel, was a selfish fear. But it is so no 
longer. Indeed I hardly know fear ; for how can the 
tempests harm her 1 Is she not too good to suffer 
any of the wrath of heaven } 

And in nights of calm, — hoiy nights, we lean over 
the ship's side, looking down, as once before, into the 
dark depths, and murmur again snatches of ocean 
song, and talk of those we love ; and we peer among the 



276 R E V E 11 I E S 7 A 11 A C H E L O R . 

stars, wbicli seem neighborly, and as if Ibey were the 
homes of friends. And as the great occan-swclls 
come rocking under us, and carry us up and down 
along the valleys and the hills of water, they seem 
like deep pulsations of the great heart of nature, 
heaving us forward toward the goal of life, and to the 
gates of heaven ! 

We watch the ships as they come upon the hori- 
zon, and sweep toward us, like false friends, with the 
sun glittering on their sails ; and then shift theu* 
coarse, and bear away — with their bright sails, turned 
to spots of shadow. We watch the long winged 
birds skimming the waves hour after hour, — like 
pleasant thoughts — now dashing before our bows, and 
then sweeping behind, until they are lost in the hollows 
of the water. 

Again life lies open, as it did once before ; but the 
regrets, disappointments, and fruitless resolves do 
not come to trouble me now. It is the future, 
which has become as level as the sea : and she is be- 
side me, — the sharer in that future — to look out with 
me, upon the joyous sparkle of water, and to count 
with me, the dazzling ripples, that Ije between us and 
the shore. A thousand pleasant plans come up, and 
are abandoned, like the waves we leave behind us ; 
a thousand other joyous plans, dawn upon our fancy, 
like the waves that glitter before us. "We talk of 



E V E NM N G . 277 

Laurence and liis bride, v/liom wo are to -.nect ; we 
talk of ber motber, wbo is even now watcbino- the 
winds tbat waft ber child over the ocean ; we talk of 
the kindly old man, ber god-father, wbo gave ber a 
father's blessing ; we talk low, and in the twilight 
hours, of Isabel — wbo sleeps. 

At length, as the sun goes down upon a fair night, 
over the western waters which we have passed, we 
see before us, the low blue line of the shores of Corn- 
wall and Devon. In the night, shadowy ships glide 
past us with gleaming lanterns ; and in the morning, 
we sec the yellow cliffs of the Isle of Wight ; and 
standing out from the land, is the dingy sail of our 
pilot. London with its fog, roar, and crowds, has 
not the same charms that it once had ; tbat roar and 
crowd is good to make a man forget bis griefs — forget 
himself, and stupify bini with amazement. We are 
in no need of such forge tfulness. 

We roll along the banks of the sylvan river tha*- 
glides by Hampton Court ; and we toil up Richmond 
Hill, to look together upon tbat scene of water, and 
meadow, — of leafy copses, and glistening villas, of 
brown cottages, and clustered hamlets, — of solitary 
oaks, and loitering herds — all spread like a veil of 
beauty, upon the bosom of the Thames. But wo 
cannot linger here, nor even under the glorious old 
loles of ¥^indsor Forest : but we hurry on to that 



2"8 Reveriks of a Bachelor. 

sweet county of Devon, made green with its white 
skeins of water. 

Again we loiter under the oaks, where we have 
loitered before ; and the sleek deer gaze on us with 
their liquid eyes, as they gazed before. The squirrels 
sport among the boughs as fearless as ever ; and some 
wandering puss pricks her long ears at our steps, 
and bounds off along the hedge rows to her burrow. 
Again I see Cany in her velvet riding-cap, with the 
white plume ; and I meet her as I met her before, 
under the princely trees that skirt the northern ave- 
nue. I recal the evening when I sauntered out at the 
park gates, and gained a blessing from the porter's 

wife, and dreamed that strange dream ; now, the 

dream seems more real, than my life. — " God bless 
you !" — said the woman again. 

— " Aye, old lady, God has blessed me !" — and I 
fling her a guinea, not as a gift, but as a debt. 

The bland farmer lives yet ; he scarce knows me, 
until I tell him of my bout around his oat-field, at the 
tail of his long stilted plough. I find the old pew iu 
the parish church. Other holly sprigs are hung 
now; and I do not doze, for Carry is beside me. 
The curate drawls the service ; but it is pleasant to 
listen ; and I make the responses with an emphasis, 
that tells more I fear, for my joy, than for my reli- 
gion. The old groom at the mansion in the Park, 



Even v a . 279 

flas not forgotton the liard-ridiug of other days ; and 
tells long stories (to which I love to listen) of the old 
visit of mistress Carry, when she followed the hounds 
with the best of the English lasses. 

— " Yer honor may well be proud ; for not a pret- 
tier face, or a kinder heart has been in Devon, since 
mistress Carry left us !" 

But pleasant as are the old woods, full of memories, 
and pleasant as are the twilight evenings upon the 
terrace — we must pass over to the mountains of 
Switzerland. There we are to meet Laurence. 

Carry has never seen the magnificence of the Juras ; 
and as we journey over the hills between Dole, and 
the border Hue, looking upon the rolling heights 
shrouded with pine trees, and down thousands of feet, 
at the very road side, upon the cottage roofs, and 
emerald valleys, where the dun herds are feeding 
quietly, she is lost in admiration. At length we 
come to that point above the little town of Ges, from 
which you see spread out before you, the meadows 
that ^kirt Geneva, the placid surface of Luke Leuiau 
and the rough, shaggy mountains of Savoy ; — and far 
behind them, breaking the horizon with snowy cap, 
and with dark piunaclos—Mont Blanc, and the 
Needles of Chamouni. 

I point out to her in the valley below, the littlo 
town of Ferney, where stands the deserted chateau of 



280 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

Voltaire ; and beyond, upon the shores of the lake, 
the old home of de Stael ; and across, with its white 
walls reflected upon the bosom of the water, the house 
where Byron wrote the prisoner of Chillon. Among 
the grouping roofs of Geneva, we trace the dark 
cathedral, and the tall hotels shining on the edge of 
the lake. And I lell of the time, when I tramped 
down through yonder valley, with my future all 
visionary, and broken, and drank the splendor of the 
scene, only as a cjuick relief to the monotony of my 
solitary life. 

" And now. Carry, with your hand locked in 

mine, and your heart mine — yonder lake sleeping in 
the sun, and the snowy mountains with their rosy hue, 
seem like the smile of nature, bidding us be glad !" 

Laurence is at Geneva ; he welcomes Carry, as he 
would welcome a sister. He is a noble fellow, and 
tells me much of his sweet Italian wife ; and presents 

me to the smiling, blushing Enrica ! She has 

learned English now ; she has found, she says, a 
better teacher, than ever I was. Yet she welcomes 
me warmly, as a sister might ; and we talk of those 
old evenings by the blazing five, and of the one-eyed 
Maestro^ as children long sejiarated, njight talk of 
their school tasks, and of their teachers. She cannot 
tell me enough of her praises of Laurence, and of hia 



Evening. 281 

noble heart. — " You were good," — slie says, — " but 
Laurence is better." 

Carry admires her soft brown hair, and her deep 
liquid eye, and wonders how I could ever have left 
Rome ? 

Do 3'ou indeed wonder — Carry ? 

And toget'lier we go down into Savoy, to that 
marvellous valley, which lies under the shoulder of 
Mont Blanc ; and we wandered over the Mcr de Glace, 
and picked Alpine roses from the edge of the frown- 
ing glacier. We toil at night-fall up to the monas- 
tery of the Great St. Bernard, where the new forming 
icG crackles in the narrow foot-way, and the cold 
moon glistens over wastes of snow, and upon the 
windows of the dark Hospice. Again, we are among 
the granite heights, whose ledges are filled with ice, 
upon the Grimsel. The pond is dark and cold ; the 
paths are slippery ; — the great glacier of the Aar 
sends down icy breezes, and the echoes ring from rock 
to rock, as if the ice- God answered. And yet we 
neither suffer, nor fear. 

In the sweet valley of Meyringen, we part from 
Laurence : he goes northward, by Grindelwald, and 
Thun, — thence to journey westward, and to make for 
the Roman girl, a home beyond the ocean. Enrica 
bids me go on to Rome : she knows that Carry will 
love it.^ soft wann air, its ruins, its pictures and 



282 Reveries of a Balhelor. 

temples, better than these cold valleys of Switzerland, 
And she gives me kind messages for her mother, and 
for Cesare ; and should we bo in Rome at the Easter 
season, she bids ns remember her, when we listen to 
the Miserere, and when we see the great Chiesa on 

fire, and when we saunter upon the Pincian hill ; 

and remember, that it is her home. 

We follow them with our eyes, as they go up the 
steep height over which falls the white foam of the 
clattering Reichenbach ; and they wave their hands 
toward us, and disappear upon the little plateau which 
stretches toward the crystal Rosenlaui, and the tall, 
still, Engel-Horner. 

May the mountain angels guard them ! 

As we journey on toward that wonderful pass of 
Splugen, I lecal by the way, upon the heights, and in 
the valleys, the spots where 1 lingered years before ; — 
here, I plucked a flower, there, I drank from that 
cold, yellow glacier water ; and here, upon some rock 
overlooking a stretch of broken mountains, hoary with 
their eternal frosts, I sat musing upon that very Future, 
which is with me now. But never, even when the 
ice-genii were most prodigal of their fancies to tha 
wanderer, did I look for more joy, or a better angel. 

Afterward, when all our trembling upon the Alpine 
paths has gone by, we are rolling along under the 
chestnuts and lindens tha' t-kii t the banks of Como. 



Evening. 28 

We recal that sweet story of ^Fanzoni, and I point 
out, as well as I may, the loitering place of the bravi, 
and the track of poor Don Abbondio. We follow in 
the path of the discomfited Ronzi, to where the 
dainty spire, and pinnacles of the Duomo of Milan, 
glisten against the violet sky. 

Carry longs to see Venice ; its water-streets, and 
palaces have long floated in her visions. In the 
bustling activity of our own country, and in the quiet 
fields of England, that strange, half-deserted capital, 
lying in the Adriatic, has taken the strongest hold 
upon her fancy. 

So we leave Padua, and Verona behind us, and find 
ourselves upon a soft spring noon, upon the end of 
the iron road which stretches across the lagoon, 
toward Venice. With the hissing of steam in the 
ear, it is hard to think of the wonderful city, we are 
approaching. But as we escape from the carriage, 
and set our feet down into one of those strange, 
hearse-like, ancient boats, with its sharp iron prow, 
and listen to the melodious rolling tongue of the 
Venetian gondolier : — as we see rising over the watery 
plain before us, all glittering in the sun, tall, square 
towers with pyramidal tops, and clustered domes, and 
minarets ; and sparkling roofs lifting from marble 
walls — all so like the old paintings ; — and as we glide 
nearer and nearer to the fl'jatiui' wonder, under the 



284 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

silent working oar, of our now silent gondolier ; — 
as we ride up swiftly under the deep, broad shadows 
of palaces, and see plainly the play of the sea-water 
in the crevices of the masonry, — and turn into 
narrow rivers shaded darkly by overhanging walls, 
hearing no sound, but of voices, or the swaying of the 
water against the houses, — we feel the presence of the 
place. And the mystic fingers of the Past, grappling 
our spirits, lead them away — willing and rejoicing 
captives, through the long vista of the ages, that are 
gone. 

Carry is in a trance ; — rapt by the witchery of thg 
scene, into dream. This is her Venice ; nor have all 
the visions that played upon her fancy, been equal to 
the enchanting presence of this hour of approach. 

Afterward, it becomes a living thing, — stealing 
upon the affections, and upon the iraagination by a 
thousand coy advances. We wander under the warm 
Italian sunlight to the steps from which rolled the 
white head of poor Marino Faliero. The gentle 
Carry can now thrust her ungloved hand, into the 
terrible Lion's mouth. We enter the salon of the 
fearful Ten ; and peep through the half opened door, 
into the cabinet of the more fearful Three. We go 
through the deep dungeons of Carmagnola and of 
Carrara ; and we instruct the willing gondolier to 
push his dark boat urd'ir the Bridge of Sighs ; and 



Even. < g . 285 

with Rogers' poem in our hand, gUde up to the prison 
door, and read of — 

that fearful cljset at the foot 



Lurking for prey, which, when a victim came, 
Grew less and less, contracting to a span 
An iron door, urged onward by a screw, 
Forcing out life ! 



I sail, listening to nothing but the dip of the gon- 
dolier's oar, or to h(tr gantle words, fast under the 
palace duor, which closed that fearful morning, on 
the guilt and shame of Bianca Capello. Or, with 
souls lit up by the scene, into a buoyancy that can 
scarce distinguish between what is real, and what is 
merely written, — we chase the anxious step of the 
forsaken Corinna ; or seek among the veteran palaces 
the casement of the old Brabantio, — the chamber of 
Desdemona, — the house of Jes.sica, and trace among 
the strange Jew money-changers, who yet haunt the 
Rialto, the likeness of the boarded Shylock. We 
nander into stately churches, brushing o^er grass, or 
tell-tale flowers that grow in the court, and find them 
damp and cheerless ; the incense rises murkily, and 
rests in a thick cloud over the altars, and over the 
paintings ; the music if so be that the organ notes 
are swelling under the roof, is mournfully plaintive. 



286 Heveriks of a Bachelor. 

Of an afternoon wa sail over to the Lido, to glad- 
den our eyes with a si;;-ht of land and green things, 
and we pass none upon the way, save silent oa-vsnien, 
with barges piled high with the produce of then* gar- 
dens, — pushing their way down toward tlie floating 
city. And upon the narrow island, we find Jewish 
graves, half covered by drifted sand ; and from 
among them, watch the sunset glimmering over a 
desolate level of water. As we glide back, lights 
lift over the Lagoon, and double along the Guideca, 
and the Grand Canal. The little neighbor isles will 
have their company of lights dancing in the water ; 
and from among them, will rise up against the mellow 
evening sky of Italy, gaunt, unlighted houses. 

After the nightfall, which brings no hai-mful dew 
with it, I stroll, with her hand within my arm, — as 
once upon the sea, and ia the English Park, and in 
the home-land— over that great square which lies be- 
fore the palace of St. Marks. The white moon is 
riding in the m.iddle heaven, like a globe of silver ; 
the gondoliers stride over the echoing .stones ; and 
their long black shadows, stretching over the pave- 
ment, or shaking upon the moving water, seem like 
great funereal plumes, waving over the bier of Venice. 

Carrying thence whole treasures of thought and 
fancy, to feed upon in the after years, we wander to 
Rome. 



E V E .-f I N G . 287 

I find the old one-eyed maestro^ and am met with 
cordial welcome by the mother of the pretty Eurica. 
The Count has gone to the marches of Ancona. 
Lame Pietro still shuffles around the boards at the 
Lepre, and the flower sellers at the corner, bind me 
a more brilliant bouquet than ever, for a new beauty 
at Rome. As we ramble under the broken arches of 
the great aqueduct stretching toward Frascati, i tell 
Carry, the story of my trip in the Appeuines ; and 
we search for the pretty Carlotta. But she is mar- 
ried, they tell us, to a Neapolitan guardsman. In 
the spring twilight, we wander upon those heights 
which lie between Frascati and Albano ; and looking 
westward, see that glorious view of the Campagna, 
which can never be forgotten. But beyond the Cam- 
pagna, and beyond the huge hulk of St. Peter's, heav- 
ing into the sky from the middle waste, we see, or 
fancy we see, a glimpse of the sea which stretches out 
and on to the land we love, better than Rome. And 
in fancy, we build up that home, which shall belong 
to us, on the return ; — a home, that has slumbered 
long in the future ; and which, now that the future 
has come, lies fairly before me. 



288 Reveries of a Ijaciielor, 



Home. 

Years seem to have passed. They have mellowed 
life into ripeness. The start, and change, and hot 
ambition of youth, seem to have gone by. A calm, 
and joyful quietude has succeeded. That future 
which still lies before me, seems like a roseate twi- 
light, sinking into a peaceful, and silent night. 

My home is a cottage, near that where Isabel once 
lived. The same valley is around me ; the same 
brook rustles, and loiters under the gnarled roots of 
the overhanging trees. The cottage is no mock cot- 
tage, but a substantial, wide spreading cottage, with 
clustering gables, and ample shade ; — such a cottage, 
as they build upon the slopes of Devon. Vines clam- 
ber over it, and the stones show mossy through the 
interlacing climbers. There are low porches, with 
cozy arm chairs ; and generous oriels, fragrant with 
mignionette, and the blue blossoming violets. 

The chimney stacks rise high', and show clear 
against the heavy pine trees, that ward off the blasts 
of winter. The dovecote, is a habited dovecote, and 
the purple-necked pigeons swoop around the roofs, 
in great companies. The hawthorn is budding into 
its June fragrance along a]l the lines of fence ; and 



Evening. 289 

the paths are trim, and clean. The shrubs, — 
our neglected azalias and rhododendrons chiefest 
among them, — stand in picturesque groups upon the 
close shaven lawn. ' 

The gateway in the thicket below, is between two 
mossy old posts of stone; and there is a tall hem- 
lock flanked by a sturdy pine, for sentinel. "Within 
the cottage, the library is wainscotted with native 
oak ; and my trusty gun hangs upon a branching pair 
of antlers. My rod and nets are disposed above the 
generous book-shelves ; and a stout eagle, once a 
tenant of the native woods, sits perched over the cen- 
tral alcove. An old fashioned mantel is above the 
brown stone jams of the country fire-place ; and along 
it are distributed records of travel ; — little bronze 
temples from Home, the pietro duro of Florence, the 
porcelain busts of Dresden, the rich iron of Berlin, 
and a cup fashioned from a stag's horn, from the 
Black Forest by the Khine. 

Massive chairs stand here and there, in tempting 
attitude ; strewed over an oaken table in the middle, 
are the uncut papers, and volumes of the day ; and 
upon a lion's skin stretched before the hearth, is lying 
another Tray. 

But this is not all. There are children in the cot- 
tage. There is Jamie — we think him handsome — 
for he has the dark hair of his mother, and the same 
13 



290 I I E V E R I E S .> r A B A C II E L c n . 

black eye, witli its long,Iieavy fringe. There is Carry 
— little Carry I must call her dovv — with a face full 
of glee, and rosy with health ; then there is a little 
rogue sorue two years old, whom we call Paul — a 
very bad boy, — as we tell him. 

Th(i mother is as beautiful as ever, and far more 
dear to me ; for gratitude has been adding, year by 
year, to love. There have been times when a harsh 
word of mine, uttered iu tha fatigues of business, have 
touched her; and I have seen that soft eye fill with 
tears ; and I have upbraided myself for causing her 
one pang. But such things she does not remember ; 
or remembers, only to cover with her gentle forgive- 
ness. 

liaurence and Enrica arc livins; near us. And the 
old gentleman, who was Carry's god-father, sits with 
me, on sunny days upon the porch, and takes little 
Paul upon his knee, and wonders if two such daugh- 
ters as Enrica, and Carry are to be found in the 
world. At twilight, we ride over to see Laurence ; 
amie mounts with the coachman ; little Carry puts 
on her wide-rimmed Leghorn for the evening visit ; 
and the old gentleman's plea for Paul, cannot be de- 
nied. The mother too is with us ; and old Tray 
comes whisking along, now frolicking before the 
horses' heads, and then bounding off after the flight 
of some belated bird. 



Evening. 291 

Away from that cottage home, I seem away from 
life. Within it, that broad, and shadowy future, 
which lay before me in boyhood and in youth, i.s 
garnered, — like a fine mist, gathered into drops of 
crystal. 

And when away — those long letters, dating from 
the cottage home, are what tie me to life. That 
cherished wife, far dearer to me now, than when she 
wrote that first letter, which seemed a dark veil be- 
tween me and the future — writes me now, as tenderly 
as then. She narrates, in her delicate way, all the 
incidents of the home life ; she tells me of their rides, 
and of their games, and of the new planted trees ; — 
of all their sunny days, and of their frolics on the 
lawn ; she tells me how Jamie is studying, and of 
little Carry's beauty, growing every day, and of 
rogueish Paul — so like his father ! And she sends 
me a kiss from each of them ; and bids me such adieu, 
and such ' God's blessing,' that it seems as if an 
angel guarded me. 

But this is not all ; for Jamie has written a post- 
script : 

- " Dear Father," he says, " mother wishes me 

to tell you how I am studying. What would you 
think, father, "-o have me talk in French to you, 
when • ou cone back .' I wish 3'ou would come back 



292 Reveries OF a Bachelor. 

though ; the hawthorns arc coming out, and the apri- 
cot under my window is all full of blossoms. If you 
should bring me a present, as you almost always do, — 
1 would like a fishing rod. 

" Your afiectionate son, 

" Jamie." 

And little Carry has her fine, rambling characters 
running into a second postscript. 

" Why don't you come, papa ; you stay too long ; 
I have ridden the pony twice ; once he most threw 
me ofi". This is all from Carry." 

And Paul has taken the pen too, and in his extra- 
ordinary effort to make a big P, has made a very big 
blot. And Jamie writes under it — " This is PauP" 
work, Pa ; but he says it's a love blot, only he loves 
you ten hundred times more." 

And after your return, Jamie will insist that you 
should go with him to the brook, and sit down with 
him upon a tuft of the brake, to fiing off" a line into 
the eddies, though only the nibbling roach are sport- 
ing below. You have instructed the workmen to 
spare the clumps of bank-willows, that the wood-duck 
may have a covert in winter, and that the Bob-o- 
Lincolns may have a quiet nesting place in the spring. 

Sometimes your wife, — too kind to deny such favor 



E V £ N I N i; . 293 

— will sti-oll with you along the meaaow hanks, and 
you jjick meadow daisies in memory of the old time. 
Little Cany weaves them into rude chaplets, to dress 
the forehead of Paul, and they dance along the green- 
sward, and switch off the daffodils, and hlow away the 
dandelion seeds, to see if their wishes are to come 
true. Jamie holds a butter cup under Carry's chin, 
to find if she loves gold ; and Paul, the rogue, teases 
them, by stickiug a thistle into sister's curls. 

The pony has hard work to do under Carry's swift 
riding — but he is fed by her own hand, with the cold 
breakfast rolls. The nuts are gathered in time, and 
stored for long winter evenings, when the fire is burn- 
ing bright and cheerily — a true, hickory blaze, — 
which sends its waving gleams over eager, smiling 
faces, and over well-stored book shelves, and portraits 
of dear, lost ones. While from time to time, that 
wife, wbo is the soul of the scene, will break upon 
the children's prattle, with the silver melody of her 
voice, running softly and sweetly through the coup- 
lets of Crabbe's stories, or the witchery of the Flod- 
den Tale. 

Then the boys will guess conundrums, and play at fox 
and geese ; and Tray, cherished in his age, and old 
Mile petted in his dotage, lie side by side, upon the 
lion's skin, before the blazing heai-th. Little Tom- 
tit the goldfinch sits sleeping on bis perch, or cocks 



294 Reveries of a Bachelor. 

his eye at a sudden cackling of the fire, for a familiar 
squint upon our family group. 

But there is no future without its straggling clouds. 
Even now a shadow is trailing along the landscape. 

It is a soft and mild day of summer. The leaves 
are at their fullest. A southern breeze has been 
blowing up the valley all the morning, and the light, 
smoky haze hangs in the distant mountain gaps, like 
a veil on beauty. Jamie has been busy with his les- 
sons, and afterward playing with Milo upon the lawn. 
Little Carry has come in from a long ride — her face 
blooming, and her eyes all smiles, and joy. The 
mother has busied herself with those flowers she loves 
so well. Little Paul, they sny, has been playing in 
the meadow, and old Tray has gone with him. 

But at dinner time, Paul has not come back. 

" Paul ought not to ramble off so far," I say. 

The mother says nothing ; but there is a look of 
anxiety upon her face, that disturbs me. Jamie 
wonders where Paul can bo, and he saves for him, 
whatever he knows Paul will like— a heaping plate- 
full. But the dinner hour passes, and Paul does not 
come. Old Tray lies in the sun-shine by the porch. 

Now the mother is indeed anxious. And I, though 
I conceal this from her, find my fears stiangely 
active. Somethiuo; like instinct jruides me to the 



Evening. 295 

meadow : I wander down the brook-side calling — 
Paul ! — Paul ! But there is no answer. 

All the afternoon we search, and the neighbors 
search ; but it is a fruitless toil. There is no joy 
that evening : the meal passes in silence ; only little 
Carry with tears in her ej^es, asks, — if Paul will soon 
come back ? All the night we search and call : — the 
mother even braving the night air, and running here 
and there, until the morning finds us sad, and de- 
spairing. 

That day — the next — cleared up the mystery ; but 
cleared it up with darkness. Poor little Paul ! — he 
has sunk under the murderous eddies of the brook ! 
His boyish prattle, his rosy smiles, his artless talk, 
are lost to us forever ! 

I will not tell how nor when we found him : nor 
will I tell of our desolate home, and oi her grief — the 
first crushing grief of her life. 

The cottage is still. The servants glide noiseless, 
as if they might startle the poor little sleeper. The 
house seems cold — very cold. Yet it is summei 
weather ; and the south breeze plays softly along the 
meadow, and softly over the murderous eddies of the 
brook. 

Then comes the hush of burial. The kind mourn- 
ers are there : it is easy for them to mourn ! 



296 Reveries o f A Bach^ilor. 

The good clergyman prays by the bier : ' Oh, 

Thou, who did'st take uidou thyself human woe, and 
drank deep of every pang in life, let thy spirit come 
and heal this grief, and guide toward that Better 
Land, where justice and love shall reign, and hearts 
laden with anguish, shall rest forevermore !' 

Weeks roll on ; and a smile of resignation lights up 
the saddened features of the mother. Those dark 
mourning robes speak to the heart deeper, and more 
tenderly, than ever the bridal costume. She lightens 
the weight of your grief by her sweet words of resig- 
nation : — " Paul," she says, " God has taken our 
boy !" 

Other weeks roll on. Joys are still left — great and 
ripe joys. The cottage smiling in the autumn sun- 
shine is there : the birds are in the forest boughs : 
Jamie and little Carry are there ; and she, who is 
more than them all, is cheerful, and content. 
Heaven has taught us that the brightest future has 
its clouds ; — that this life is a motley of lights and 
shadows. And as we look upon the world around us, 
and upon the thousand forms of human misery, there 
is a gladness in our deep thanksgiving. 

A year goes by ; but it leaves no added shadow on 
our hearth-stone. The vines clamber, and flourish : 
the oakf are winning age and grai deur : little Carry 



Evening. 297 

is blooming into the pretty coyness of girlhood ; and 
Jamie with his daric hair, and flashing eyes, is the 
pride of his mother. 

There is no alloy to pleasure, but the remembrance 
of poor little Paul. And even that, chastened ars it 
is with years, is rather a grateful memorial that our 
life is not all here, than a grief that weighs upon our 
hearts. 

Sometimes, leaving little Carry and Jamie to their 
play, we wander at twilight to the willow tree, be- 
neath which our drowned boy sleeps calmly, for the 
Great Awaking. It is a Sunday, in the week-day of 
our life, to linger by the little ^rave, — to hang 
flowers upon the head-stone, and to breathe a prayer 
that our little Paul may sleep well, in the arms of 
Him who loveth children ! 

And her heart, and my heart, knit together by sor- 
row, as they had been knit by joy — a silver thread 
mingled with the gold — follow the dead one to the 
Land that is before us ; until at last we come to 
reckon the boy, as living in the new home, whicli 
when this is old, shall be ours also. And my spirit, 
speaking to his spirit, in the evening watches, seems 
to say joyfully — .so joyfully that the tears half choke 
the utterance — " Paul, my boy, we will be there .'" 

And the mother, turning her face to mine, so that 
I see the moistur^ in her eye, and catch its heavenly 



298 Reveries of a Baciij:lor. 

look, whispers softly — so softly, that an angel might 
have said it, — " Yes, dear, we will be there !" 



The night had now come, and my day under the 
oaks was ended. But a crimson belt yet lingered 
over the horizon, though the stars were out. 

A line of shaggy mist lay along the surface of the 
brook. I took my gun from beside the tree, and my 
shot-pouch from its limb, and whistling for Carlo — as 
if it had been Tray — I strolled over the bridge, and 
down the lanejo the old house under the elms. 

I dreamed pleasant dreams that night ; for 

I dreamed that my Reverie was real. 



The End 



iiRRARY OF CONGRESS 

015 971 568 1 



